The United States Supreme Court has ruled that a strip search of a 13-year-old girl in a hunt for ibuprofen (brand name: Advil) was unconstitutional. The court relied on a 1985 precedent that requires searches of students take into account the severity of the offense and the age and sex of the student. While the application of such a vague standard is clearly difficult in some cases, it is not in a search for Advil.

The case, Safford Unified School District v. Redding, has become the flashpoint of growing concern about “zero tolerance” policies governing weapons and drugs in schools. While there is certainly a legitimate school interest in keeping cocaine, meth, guns, and knives out of schools, the application of these policies has frequently wandered into the ridiculous. Students have been suspended and expelled for pen knives accidentally in backpacks, pens that are too pointy, and Tylenol. Flintstone vitamins now exist in a scary legal world where their possession could result in the same punishment from the school as possession of a machete.

Hopefully, the court’s ruling today indicates the beginning of the end for the madness.