LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: JOURNALISTS FEEL SAFER WITH LIBERAL SUPREME COURT JUSTICES

To the Editor:

If Mona Charen cannot understand why the press would applaud departing U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justices Thurgood Marshall and Harry Blackmun, then she is obtuse -- even beyond the usual standards of obtuseness to be expected of a former speechwriter in the Reagan White House.

Based on Charen's past columns and the one which I have before me (Southeast Missourian, 14 April), she (A.) doesn't feel that women should have the right to choose between abortion and parturition [editor's note: parturition is defined as "the act or process of giving birth; childbirth] or (B.) doesn't agree with the way that the U.S. Supreme Court arrived at their decision defending such a right or (C.) both.

As I recall, the Sinister Simpleton came to power on the strength of the slogan, "Get Government off the backs of the American people!" With regard to the issue of abortion vs. parturition, what a sick joke that was! Most people interpreted that catch-phrase has intending that, wherever possible, decisions would be taken on the lowest level by the entities most closely affected. Sometimes the appropriate decision-taking level is the Federal level; sometimes it is the state, county or municipal level. Often enough, though, the appropriate decision-taking level is the personal level.

I would not concede to government -- on any level -- the power to decide whether a woman will complete or abort her pregnancy. On this issue Blackmun and a majority of the Court articulated and defended the empowerment of the individual. I can see why this doesn't please the Authoritarian Right.

The press more than most institutions -- presumably excluding Ms. Charen -- ought to be highly sensitive to issues surrounding civil liberties, since, under authoritarian regimes, they are usually the first to be put on the short leash or worse.

I believe that the journalists' applause for Associate Justices Marshall and Blackmun (and Charen's hypothetical withholding of same in the case of Thomas and Scalia) rests not so much on the issue of abortion (important enough!) as on the issue of rights in general. Journalists know that they are safer with the Marshalls and Blackmuns than with the Thomases and Scalias.

DONN S. MILLER

Tamms, Ill.