INCOHERENT RAMBLING ABOUT LEGALIZATION

To the editor:

The person responsible for The Monitor View must be doing a bit of
"snorting" himself. I refer to the view of Jan. 2 -- the advocating of the
legalization of drugs as a protection of our rights and civil liberties.
One would not expect to read such incoherent ramblings in our prestigious
Monitor.

"What a peaceable person decides to put into his body is no business of the
government"? When the consequences of what "a peaceable person decides to
put into his body" infringe on the rights of another peaceable person, it
does become a community concern. The same as if that peaceable person takes
a drink too many and runs a stoplight, which is one of our community
problems, then it is of concern not only to the family of those killed, but
to the entire community whose safety is threatened.

In some states, it is of community concern when a pregnant woman takes
drugs. It is a concern when that pregnant woman drinks alcohol, resulting
in birth handicaps that becomes the community's problem in attempting to
salvage that young life.

What The Monitor recommends as the answer to the country's drug problem was
tried in Zurich, Switzerland, in the early '90s, when the government
abdicated its responsibility by initiating just such an experiment. Zurich
became the Mecca and magnet for the world's junkies. I just hope I never
see such a junkyard of wrecked lives and lost hope -- especially in my own
country.

Does this experiment that The Monitor advocates include the date rape pill,
LSD, ecstasy or whatever else is out there?

We are having the fight of our lives in reducing teen smoking and drinking.
Making drugs more accessible and affordable will only condemn more to the
scrap pile and greatly increase teen suicide -- but is it really none of
our business? Get real, Monitor.

Walter C. Hickman, Mission