Behind the Badge

Sir: As one of the newest policemen in the St. Louis police department, I read with extreme interest your article "Police: The Thin Blue Line " [July 19]. You noted with accuracy that one of the basic needs of metropolitan departments is better-educated officers. Most metropolitan departments do little if any recruiting on a college level because they are convinced they have nothing to offer the graduate.

As a recent graduate of St. Louis University, I beg to differ. Analyze what today's graduate is looking for in a career. If his education has weaned him away from the ideal of "self" and toward the ideal of "awareness and contribution" as regards the problems of society, the graduate is looking for a career in which he can commit himself to help solve these problems. Police work will give him that chance. Law-enforcement executives and college placement bureaus should plan programs toward this goal. Perhaps then the two poles of "cop" and "professional" can be reconciled.

Louis STEPHENS

Probationary Patrolman

St. Louis

Sir: I am now in Viet Nam, but while I was at home on leave, I myself noticed a change for the better in the police force of Los Angeles. Being a Negro, and part of this younger generation, I wish to say to Chief Reddin that we are watching closely. It is good to know that the residents of Los Angeles now have someone in the police chief's office who gives a damn.

(SP/4) EDWARD D. LEE JR.

U.S.A.

A.P.O., San Francisco

Sir: I would just like to add a brief comment to your fine account of the improved public relations efforts of the Los Angeles Police Department:

When my high school government class was visited last year by a young police officer, I looked with skepticism on the idea of his communicating anything to a group of intelligent, liberal-minded, middle-class students. But after the first awkward exchanges, my initial impression softened, for here was no hardened, authoritarian, put-'em-in-their-place cop but rather someone who thought, acted, and talked on our level. We fell into easy discussion and learned not only what he did as a cop but also why he was doing it and how it felt to be doing it--that he was sometimes scared.

If it is important for ghetto children to understand and respect the police, it is just as essential that we whom adults are fond of calling "leaders of tomorrow" also gain insight into the fact that policemen are human beings. I think I get the message.

GIGI DOTY

Studio City, Calif.

Sir: I take offense at your statement "Without question, New York City police used extreme, sometimes brutal tactics ... at Columbia University." These "brutal tactics" you refer to caused one police sergeant to be hospitalized after students stomped on his chest. Another officer was hospitalized after a student jumped on his back--from a second-story window. This officer is now virtually paralyzed --unable to sit or stand without excruciating pain. These policemen were just doing their jobs--and without nightsticks, I might add.

JOHN MOSCHETTO

Patrolman

New York City

Sir: Much of the hatred of cops comes not from their attempts to enforce criminal law but from the use of sheriffs' uniformed deputies to perform the dirty work required for the economic discrimination against and exploitation of the poor. It is in this capacity that they are imperialists in the ghetto.

In the ghetto, when a man in uniform comes to the door he is not selling tickets to a ball; he has come to take your, home, your job, your possessions, or your children. It is the innumerable writs of execution that the sheriff's office has served over many years that are killing people today.

JAN PAUW

President

Stanford Legal Aid Society

Stanford, Calif.

Sir: COP, as any Englishman worth his roast beef will tell you, is derived from the expression "C(onstable) O(n) P(atrol)."

C. REYNOLDS

Manhattan

R&R

Sir: You said, speaking of Governor Rockefeller's proposal for peace in Viet Nam: "Little of what Rocky said was new" [July 19]. The proposal of Governor Rockefeller is almost precisely the same as the one that Dr. Radhakrishnan, ex-President of India, has been advocating for several years. It may be that Governor Rockefeller and Dr. Radhakrishnan arrived at this plan independently. If so, it strengthens the case for the plan in that two independent sources--one Eastern and one Western--reviewing the same facts, came to the same conclusions. Dr. Radhakrishnan told me that Russia, Czechoslovakia, Japan and the U.S. expressed their willingness to accept the plan. China, characteristically, was not willing.

It may be added that Governor Rockefeller spoke of a police force "largely Asian" while Dr. Radhakrishnan said, "Asian-African." Asia would thus be taking the initiative to settle an Asian question, and would be disposed to help keep the peace. But the bigger point is that Governor Rockefeller has made this plan a national and world issue. I congratulate him--a great and brave step. If the present negotiations in Paris should get into a jam, they might turn to this plan.

DR. E. STANLEY JONES

Manhattan

Plato for President

Sir: In your Essay on the White House hero [July 26], you speak of a reformer one day calling for a Presidential Academy. Plato proposed the idea in ancient Greece. He called for the institutionalization of promising youngsters, who were to be schooled thoroughly in mathematics, philosophy, fine arts and gymnastics. There would be no personal wealth nor family life--they would, however, be permitted to mate under "civic control" with specially selected women. At 35, the Grecian would graduate from the process as the perfect leader--void of personal ambition and with concern solely for the well-being of the Greek democratic system.

Plato's follower, Aristotle, disagreed with the abolition of family life, but applied much of the Presidential Academy teachings to the son of Philip II of Macedonia at the ruler's request. Who emerged from the system and conquered a major portion of the world? Alexander the Great.

C. G. JONES

Lake Shawnee, N.J.

Freedom Now

Sir: What is all this about Scotland's winning "temporary independence" at the battle of Bannockburn in 1314 [July 19]? Millions of Scots are under the impression that they still have this independence, though it must be admitted that some are a bit upset about the consequences of the Act of Union, the voluntary coming together of the Scottish and English parliaments in 1707.

J. E. ANDERSON

Manhattan

Color & the Camera

Sir: Your article "Black & White Dating" [July 19] really made me angry. Most young people, and even some older ones, date because they like each other. They see only human beings to date, to love, to work with. Then comes a desperate reporter with his "color" camera, and the myth of race gets another two-page spread. Get off our backs and let us live as human beings. To hell with race.

ROBERT MANARD

Brattleboro, Vt.

Sir: I have to agree with the statement made by Georgia Herrick: "I was trying to prove something to myself, a reaffirmation of the liberal beliefs I had been brought up under." It seems to me that usually this is the reason why a Negro dates a white, or the other way around. Few couples are ready to cope with the problems of interracial dating. They are, whether they admit it or not, bound by society's taboos, and these rules do not allow them the openness needed for a good relationship.

LINDA STACIOKAS

Waterbury, Conn.

Sir: Black and white men do not now trust each other. Women mostly do. Most of us have the same occupation--housewife--the same problems and the same domestic drives. What a pity the men can't concentrate on their common problems and drives and put the battle back where it belongs--between the sexes!

(MRS.) CHRISTINA F. HILL

Plainfield, NJ.

Feeding Baby

Sir: In reference to your article on breast feeding, [July 19] I, as the mother of four, would never have thought of depriving the head of our household and love of my life, my husband, the joy and pleasure of getting up at 2:30 a.m. to give our babies their bottles.

(MRS.) RITA MARGOLIN

Yorktown Heights, N.Y.

Sir: Many women in foreign countries, seeking to be "modern" like the emancipated American woman, turned from breast feeding to formula. But because of lack of careful sterilization methods, the infant mortality rate rose. Could not the Peace Corps be effective in re-educating these women? How many dollars would be saved in our foreign aid food programs if thousands of these women would return to their older, superior method?

And what about our own poverty program? Why should it be just the "highly educated and sophisticated" woman who is moving back to the "womanly art of breast feeding"? There are benefits for everyone--mothers, babies and even the American economy.

MAUREEN SCHEUERMANN

Pittsburgh

Sir: Not only should we women take advantage of scientific bottle feeding, but we should encourage research on test-tube reproduction to free us from the animal miseries of childbearing, so that we would have the time and. energy to utilize our brainpower for a better society.

(MRS.) M. D. MICHAEL

Hanover, Pa.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.