A WELCOME NEW VOICE FOR DRUG LAW REFORM

Whether readers found Charles Paul Stephens' Aug. 23 guest column on
failed American drug policy infuriating, unsettling, illuminating,
inspiring, or all of these, his estimable work cannot be dismissed as
filler for what Globe-News editorialist Dave Henry recently dubbed
"the public's page for ranting and raving."

A few years ago, I attended a League of Women Voters seminar on drug
policy. The panel included criminal justice professionals and
representatives of the black and Hispanic communities. Concerned
citizens gathered in a standing-room-only hall evidently because they
considered the drug problem grave, with current policy piling on more
problems than it solves effectively.

Were these citizens just a bunch a dopes, prisoners of vain hope that
they might "fight dope" in a "drug-friendly" society that so
profitably markets pills and potions, weeds and pipes - with the
promise that pleasure can be attained, pain avoided, at all costs?

Walter Cronkite is among eminent Americans who lend their voices to
drug law reform. Stephens' contribution is as eloquent as anything
I've read on this subject by Cronkite and others. If another public
meeting on drug policy is convened - and it should be! - Stephens
merits a place on the panel.

Ann Rothkrug Warnecke

Amarillo