The Wrong Way to Catch Drunks

* Re “Laguna Beach to Debate End of Sobriety Checkpoints,” (July 8): Betsy Jenkins, president of the Laguna Beach Unified PTA Council, said, “Parents of the PTA are very upset at the possibility of losing the checkpoints because we feel a little inconvenience or stepping on some 1st Amendment rights is well worth the price of getting some drunk drivers off the road.”

Stepping on some 1st Amendment rights is well worth the price? Oh my, what is this world coming to? My feisty little Canadian grandmother must be turning over in her grave right now.

Women like her, who went to normal school and taught the next generation during the 1890s in Wisconsin, didn’t stop at the 3 Rs. They were emphatic about skepticism and logic. Her retort: “Two wrongs don’t make a right.” Make that “One wrong doesn’t make a right.”

If that’s too Victorian, how about, “The end doesn’t justify the means?”

KATHLEEN PATRICIA WHITE

Stanton

* Setting up roadblocks by the police to catch drunk drivers is just for show. It would be easy to apprehend them if they were serious. They should be at most bars at closing time, and it would be like catching fish in a barrel. However, they would rather incur the wrath of the public than deal with irate bar owners.

MELVIN BRAGMAN

Laguna Woods