MAYOR HAS NO RIGHT TO CONFISCATE CARS

Editor -- On May 11, The Chronicle reported ``S.F. Mayor Wants Cops to
Seize Drug Buyers' Cars.'' It would be an understatement to say that I
am appalled.

I visit San Francisco occasionally to see family members, and I have
always been under the impression that the politicians of San Francisco
are progressive folks who have resisted the insanity being practiced
everywhere under the thundercloud of a ``War on Drugs.''

Thankfully, a bipartisan group of the House Judiciary Committee has
introduced a civil asset forfeiture reform bill which would curb the
gross violations of constitutional rights being committed in the vain
attempt to make this Prohibition work. It has the support of
representatives as politically far apart as Barney Frank, D-Mass., and
Bob Barr, R-Ga.

Prohibition was conceived by people who still believed in phrenology,
bloodletting and spontaneous generation of maggots from meat. No
wonder it didn't work. The only wonder is that we are still trying.

GREG GOLDMAKHER
Dallas