Roots of crime
According to the Children's Defense Fund and other sources, one of every four children in our country grows up in poverty, a higher percentage than in any of the other developed countries.
It is impossible for children who are poor not to have feelings of rage, despair and hopelessness that create crime and drug use.
What is Del. Clarence Davis's solution to the crime problem? Caning 14-year-old children, up to 10 strokes of a rattan cane.
For even suggesting this unconstitutional and ignorant proposal, Davis ought to be caned until his skin peels off his back.
It is to be hoped that the state of Maryland turns its attention to the main cause of juvenile criminality, namely poverty, instead of listening to this violent man.
Gerald Ben Shargel
Reisterstown
Caning
Del. Clarence Davis' proposal to promote caning of juvenile offenders is an understandable response to the powerlessness many of us feel in the face of anti-social and criminal behavior. However, it won't work.
At Baltimore Medical System (BMS), a community health center system serving 38,000 people in Delegate Davis' East Baltimore district, we care for people every day for whom violence is a part of everyday life.
Most children experience corporal punishment from very young ages. More adolescents and young adults in East Baltimore are injured or die from violence than from any other cause.
Teen-aged girls endure beatings by their boyfriends as the price a relationship.
The initiation rite for many gangs is to receive a beating from ranking gang members. The threat and experience of violence is worn as a badge of honor by many young people.
Given this climate, will caning be effective?
Does adding intentional brutality to the criminal justice system act as a deterrent or does it legitimize violence as an instrument of socialization?
And do we really believe that people who are having trouble finding their place in our society will be helped by beating them?
The laws says that the Department of Social Services may remove from a home a child who has been struck with sufficient force to leave a mark. Assault is against the law.
Hopefully, we are trying to lead our society in a direction of less violence. This measure would legitimize brutality, leading us in the opposite direction.
Caning is not the answer. Let's find another way to teach our young people to respect authority, property and themselves.
Anne Walker
Baltimore
Domestic law
The arrogant demand of Judge James C. Cawood, "I want it (Family Court) now," illustrates the problems of creating another legal boondoggle.
Domestic law is a bottomless pit of profit for an entourage of legal leeches, and an economic drain on the country.
Judge Kathleen O'Ferrall Friedman desires more experts at her disposal to make Family Court function. The court already has its own psychological services for evaluations.
These services maintain secrecy in depriving litigants of their evaluations. The evaluations are often at odds with privately obtained evaluations in custody cases.
By extending the power of a Family Court, judges will increase their own power and the wealth of their lawyer and evaluator friends.
Courts have encouraged chaos by depriving children of their rights to know their parents. Despite the addition of many laws, thousands of children continue to be taken by parents who defy the court.
It is time for our society to recognize the inherent impotence of our legal system and start solving problems through mediation instead of deception.
Robert L. Schwartz
Towson
Hard truths
People who know the truth about World War II are elated that the famous aircraft "Enola Gay" will be exhibited in the proper manner.
I'm sure that the Smithsonian Institution has done an excellent job of restoring the plane and skipping the distortions.
William Smith (letter, Feb. 14) sounds like one of Jane Fonda's disciples with his ramblings about so-called American atrocities in World War II.
The bombing of Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Tokyo, Dresden and other cities in Japan and Germany were acts of war, period.
Mr. Smith neglected to mention the Holocaust in Europe, Pearl Harbor, the Bataan death march and other "real" atrocities committed by Japan and Germany.
The message behind the bombings by the United States and its allies was simple: "Surrender or else."
Germany and Japan started the war. The Allies finished it. I suggest that Mr. Williams come to grips with reality.
Jack Kelly
Overlea
Not a 'bozo'
I frequently read Frank DeFilippo's political commentaries, and for the most part they are well-written and insightful.
However, Mr. DeFilippo's Feb. 16 article ("Glendening's wonks don't have Baltimore accent") gravitated from factual reporting to personal attack.
In the article, he characterizes several people as "the old Harborplace crowd of Baltimore bozos." I am at a loss to explain why Mr. DeFilippo would characterize someone like Mark Wasserman as a "bozo."
I had the pleasure of working with Mark for the better part of five years. He was sincere, honest, caring, loyal, hard-working and extremely dedicated to the citizens of Maryland.
Anyone who had the privilege of working with Mark would recognize that he was anything but a "bozo." He performed admirably in many public capacities and he does not deserve such denigration by Mr. DeFilippo.
I believe an apology is in order.
John R. Miller
Timonium
Make children pay?
I am dismayed and anguished to learn that the administrator of the Child Support Enforcement Agency, Brian Shea, proposes charging a collection fee for child support from the recipients.
This proposal is negative and counterproductive, and would result in poorer children and, in the long term, further burdens on the state.
If there were a clear political and moral mandate in our state that the non-custodial parent contribute fully to the support of his or her own flesh and blood, then aggressive collection procedures should be used. They do work.
There are many ways to pay for collecting child support other than taking money away from the quietly desperate children.
The federal government charges interest and fees to delinquent taxpayers. Maryland can do at least the same in child support matters.
osepha Caraher
Baltimore
Honoring the veterans of World War II
I would like to pass on a wonderful experience I had with my son Feb. 19 at the Marine Corps Museum at the Washington Navy Yard.
My wife, my 4-year-old son and I were visiting the museum when about 40 Marine World War II veterans wearing red and yellow 50th-anniversary battle of Iwo Jima shirts came in.
My son noticed the veterans and asked who they were. I told him that they were heroes who had fought the Japanese during WWII at a place called Iwo Jima.
Later my son walked over to one of the veterans and rendered a hand salute. The veteran smiled and returned the salute.
My son then asked him, "Are you a veterinarian?" The veteran laughed and said, "You mean a veteran?" He said he had been wounded in battle at Iwo Jima.
Hearing this conversation between my son and the Marine veteran filled me with pride for both my son and the man he was talking to. When it was time to go, my son shook the veteran's hand and snapped another salute. I could see that the man was as touched by the experience as I was.
I never got his name, but I hope he sees this letter because I would like to say "thanks" for being so gentle with my son, but most of all for being a hero.
Charles J. Bury Jr.
Baltimore