ROCKEFELLER DRUG LAWS ARE A TRAVESTY

Sheryl McCarthy's recent column "It's Time for Tough Questions About
Drug Laws," [Viewpoints, May 9] on drug offense sentencing reform is
one of the best I have seen in a long time. It takes particular
cowardice for politicians to avoid this issue while thousands of
perfectly harmless citizens rot in prison for petty drug crimes. Thank
goodness, the media have started to give reasonable coverage to this
debacle, and change can't be more than another election away.

DANNY TERWEY
Pacifica, Calif.

Sheryl McCarthy writes a fine column about the travesty of the
Rockefeller drug laws there in New York. So much injustice has been
generated by those laws. The drug prohibition is responsible for much
injustice, but it is particularly bad there in New York State.

RICHARD SINNOTT
Fort Pierce, Fla.