I Refuse.

• Author: Huebner, Bernie
• Position: The fingerprinting of Maine school teachers brings protest

Teachers in Maine revolt against fingerprinting

I've been teaching elementary schoolchildren in central Maine for the past twenty years. We have an unstated bargain between us: I help them grow a little older while they help me stay young. They've kept their side of the bargain, and I've tried to keep mine. But I may not be able to keep it much longer.

I am one of 47,000 Maine school employees currently required to submit to fingerprinting and FBI criminal history records checks as part of a hysterical state attempt to expose and root out supposed pedophiles. If we refuse to comply, we lose our certification and our jobs. I, and at last count fifty-six other teachers representing 1,050 years of experience in education, refuse to comply.

Why would teachers from all across Maine take such a radical step--one that will force us to abandon our jobs, our careers, and the work we love? Because we believe we have no moral choice. We see the law as a clear violation of our rights. This obscene and ineffective law strikes at the heart of the constitutional guarantee against unreasonable search and seizure. We must choose between abandoning our jobs and livelihoods and professional passion, on the one hand, and abandoning one of our most deeply held principles on the other: presumed innocence. It is no choice at all.

It all began in 1997. No one seems to know who initially proposed the idea, but with virtually no notice the Maine Legislature unanimously passed "An Act to Provide Record Checks of Elementary and Secondary Education Employees and Applicants." But due to the state's unpreparedness to implement the law, it did not finally begin to take effect until this summer. Last winter and spring, a significant number of teachers waged a campaign that finally convinced the legislature to amend the law by exempting all existing school personnel from having to be fingerprinted. The bill went to Governor Angus King's desk for his signature in late April.

For the dozens of teachers who were refusing to submit, it was a hopeful moment. But after all of five minutes of consideration, King vetoed the new bill. He thus left in place the original draconian law requiring the fingerprinting and checking of all teachers, administrators, bus drivers, cafeteria workers, coaches, secretaries, custodians, even contractors like electricians and plumbers and staff development consultants who might come in contact with children, no matter how fleetingly.

The governor's veto sealed the professional fate of the fifty-seven of us...