DON'T ABANDON ROCKEFELLER DRUG LAWS

Former state Sen. John Dunne continuously reminds us that although he
sponsored the legislation that wrote the first chapter of New York's canon
of tough drug laws, he considers the experiment to have been a total
failure. Having seen in those years the repeated rise and fall of history's
most powerful drug mafias, the damage they have done and the cost of taking
them down, he knew what he was talking about.

Has there been a total failure? I think not.

The drug problem is, in fact, unprecedented in human history. Our
Anglo-American philosophy of criminal justice has always been based on the
concept of individual criminal responsibility. How was it, without some
kind of adaptation, to address what is, in effect, a rampaging epidemic
that manifested itself in crime and socially destructive behavior? We could
have done much worse.

Treading carefully and responsibly in the direction of reforming our drug
laws, Gov. Pataki has set the right pace. It will take time and it won't
make everybody happy now. But it's the right thing to do.

To the people who disagree with him, I'd offer the bit of Vulcan wisdom
that Mr. Spock left behind when he laid down his life to save the USS
Enterprise and its crew in "The Wrath of Khan": "Sometimes, the needs of
the many outweigh the needs of the few."

TERRY O'NEILL

Albany