The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

INTRO

JIM LEHRER: Good evening and a happy New Year. Next week's Shultz-Gromyko talks in Geneva dominated today's holiday headlines as President Reagan talked U.S. strategy in California with Secretaries Shultz and Weinberger. Pravda expressed optimism about results in a commentary from Moscow, and the Pope encouraged both sides in his New Year's message from the Vatican. Robin? ROBERT MacNEIL: This is tonight's NewsHour lineup. After the summary of the news of the day we have three focus sections: a debate on what's behind the rash of abortion clinic bombings; another debate on whether roadblocks to catch drunk drivers are unconstitutional. That's followed by a documentary look at the effort to ban liquor advertising. Then a tax expert takes us through the changes in your taxes that take effect today. And we end with a collection of political cartoons that sum up the year 1984.News Summary

LEHRER: Arms control was on the official mind today as the new year began. President Reagan is meeting tonight with his top advisers in Palm Springs. California. The subject is the U.S. position on arms control and other issues going into next week's meeting in Geneva between Secretary of State Shultz and Soviet Foreign Minister Gromyko. Shultz was at the California session along with Defense Secretary Weinberger, National Security Adviser Robert McFarland and other top advisers. There was also word today from the Soviet Union on Geneva, and it was mostly encouraging. An official commentary in the newspaper Pravda said the new year gives rise to new hopes that the Soviet Union is willing to work out accords with the United States on nuclear and space armaments, among other things. The whole tone of the statement was upbeat and was particularly notable for its lack of the strident, anti-U.S. rhetoric that usually marks such commentary. Robin?

MacNEIL: Pope John Paul II said that the forthcoming Geneva talks offer a ray of hope on the horizon of the world. Speaking to 40,000 people in St. Peter's Square to mark the Church's annual day of peace the Pope said the choice of negotiations is a choice of wisdom, even though the process will not be easy. Here's a report from Graham Shenton of Visnews.

GRAHAM SHENTON, Visnews [voice-over]: [The Pope] delivered the major statement on the arms race on the Roman Catholic Church's World Day of Peace. In a mass at St. Peter's Basilica and later addressing thousands in St. Peter's Square, the pontiff spoke of the glimmer of hope offered by the coming round of arms talks between the United States and the Soviet Union in Geneva. But he warned that only a radical change in relations between nations would ensure lasting peace. The talks could be successful, the Pope said, if both sides realized they risked mutual destruction, if the dialogue was honest,and if sufficient systems of verification were accepted. Referring to the so-called Star Wars weapons, Pope John Paul noted that the production of sophisticated devices was being consumed in a race for continuing superiority. The Pope said energies and resources freed by disarmament should be used to solve major human problems, including world hunger and human development.

LEHRER: That report was by Graham Shenton of Visnews.

Another abortion clinic was bombed today. It is located in the southeast section of Washington, D.C. Officials sifted the damage for clues this morning. The explosion came shortly after midnight, causing parts of the building to collapse. No one was injured, no one has been arrested, and no person or group has claimed credit for the action. Washington Mayor Marion Berry visited the site in the early morning hours, and he had this to say.

Mayor MARION BERRY, District of Columbia: Where does this stop? Now a clinic; next time it's somebody's house, next time it's a synagogue, next time it's a church. And America does not need this type of deranged mentality. Suppose somebody had been walking past here who lives in this neighborhood and had been killed by it. This is just as terroristic as those who bombed our embassy in Lebanon. It's just as terroristic as those who would hijack airplanes. It's just as terroristic as those who would assassinate the prime minister of India. There's no difference in it. And if Americans don't understand that then they are misguided.

LEHRER: Today's bombing follows the arrest Sunday of a 21-year-old man for the bombing of three Florida abortion clinics Christmas Day. A second man was arrested today in connection with those three incidents, as well as an earlier one in June. All of this has prompted renewed charges today against the anti-abortion movement for allegedly fostering such violence. That charge and others is the subject of our lead focus segment tonight.

MacNEIL: A murderer traveling under armed guard hijacked an American Airlines plane to Havana last night and was taken into custody by the Cubans. The man was identified as Ishmal Ali Labeet, who was convicted in the killing of eight people in a golf club in St. Croix on the Virgin Islands. When the plane finally arrived in New York early this morning, some of the 198 passengers said they saw him come out of the restroom with a gun and disarm the three federal marshals who were escorting him back to prison after a civil lawsuit in St. Croix. Today the FAA said it will review the rules for moving prisoners aboard planes.

LEHRER: There was more news about the new China today. In a speech by leader Deng Xiaopeng revealed that thousands of Chinese have been executed in an 18-month crackdown on crime. The speech did not give a figure, but the Reuters news service said other sources said the number was somewhere between five and 10 thousand since the crackdown began in August, 1983. Deng said in his speech he personally supervised the anti-crime effort, and he said it will continue. A spokesman for the Public Security Ministry had said when the drive began that there had been an upsurge in the crimes of rape, embezzlement, robbery and drug-peddling and that "in a country like ours, with one billion people, it is good to have some people executed so as to educate the others."

Also in that part of the world today there were clashes between the armies of Thailand and Vietnam along the Thai-Cambodia border. Fighting between the Vietnamese and Cambodian guerrillas is now in its eighth day. Thereis no independent information on casualties or on what the new fighting involving the Thais could lead to.

MacNEIL: More than 300 Americans have died so far in traffic accidents in the New Year's weekend beginning last Friday. Snow and freezing rain created dangerous road conditions in the Midwest and the Northeast. The National Safety Council has estimated that up to 450 people will die on the nation's roads this long weekend. In many states authorities made special efforts this year to keep the death toll down with increased patrols and use of sobriety checkpoints to detect drunk drivers. One of our focus sections after the news summary will examine whether those checkpoints are constitutional. Violence Against Abortion

LEHRER: Blowing up abortion clinics has become an increasingly popular pastime for some individuals or groups opposed to abortion. The debate over who is really responsible, indirectly as well as directly, is the subject of our lead focus segment tonight. We do it tonight because at 10 minutes after midnight on this first day of 1985 another bomber struck, the target being the largest abortion clinic in Washington, D.C. It was just 24 hours before that federal agents arrested 21-year-old Matthew Goldsby in Florida for committing four such bombing attacks, three of them on Christmas Day. The authorities said they also found evidence Goldsby may be part of secret organization dedicated to firebombing abortion clinics. A second man was arrested and charged in the Florida bombings today. He was identified as James Thomas Simmons, 21, of Contonement, Florida. Those on the other side of the abortion issue, the so-called pro-choice side, say not enough is being done to stop the bombings of these clinics and suggest an encouraging climate for the violence is being created by their other side, the so-called right-to-life movement. We join that debate now, first with Nanette Falkenberg, executive director of the National Abortion Rights Action League, the lobbying arm of the pro-choice movement.

Ms. Falkenberg, how has the organized right-to-life movement encouraged such violence?

NANETTE FALKENBERG: Well, while I certainly would not want to suggest that the right-to-life organizations are participating in this, I think that the fact that they have not more actively condemned the violence, that they have not done more to stop the violence, does give some aid and encouragement.

LEHRER: How could they stop it?

Ms. FALKENBERG: Well, I think a couple of things. I think some of -- some encouragement, tacit though it may be, comes right from the top, comes from the President of the United States. Our President has condemned terrorism internationally for the past two years, and yet he has done nothing to stop or to criticize or condemn the over 30 acts of terrorism that have occurred around abortion clinics in the last 12 months in this country. And by failing to do so, I think, the government gives some tacit encouragement to these people, who are breaking federal laws every time one of these incidents occurs.

LEHRER: And the right-to-live movement is doing the same thing, you say?

Ms. FALKENBERG: Yeah, I think so. I mean, I think that there could be some more active involvement in finding out who these people are. We now know that in at least two of the incidents, the one in Everett, Washington, and the one in Pensacola, Florida, the people involved had some either direct or indirect links to the so-called established right-to-life groups. And, as I said, while I am not saying that these groups are responsible, I think that the movement has a responsibility to do whatever it can to make sure that no more federal laws are violated no more violence occurs.

LEHRER: And it's responsibility they are not meeting, in your opinion?

Ms. FALKENBERG: I think that's right, yes.

LEHRER: What impact are these acts of violence having on your movement, or on the pro-choice side of this?

Ms. FALKENBERG: Well, obviously there is a great deal of concern for the people who work in clinics, for the people who are needing to use the clinics to avail themselves of abortion services. And the chilling effect that it has both on the people who work there and on the people who have to use the clinics, I think, is becoming more and more obvious.

LEHRER: In what way?

Ms. FALKENBERG: Well, one of the doctors, for example, in Pensacola said that he will not be reopening his clinic.

LEHRER: Pensacola is where three of those -- the Christmas Eve or Christmas Day bombings were.

Ms. FALKENBERG: That's right. Landlords become more and more reluctant to rent; insurance companies become more and more reluctant to insure. And I think one of the points I would want to make here is that, you know, the Supreme Court has said that women have the constitutional right to choose to have an abortion in this country. If they cannot have access to those services, then their rights are being denied. And as it becomes potentially more and more difficult to have access to these clinics, women's constitutional rights are being violated. I think that it is getting harder and harder to work in those clinics and more and more frightening.

LEHRER: Thank you. Robin?

MacNEIL: We have a different view from one of the groups leading the anti-abortion or "pro-life" movement in this country. The National Right to Life Committee represents grassroots organizations in all 50 states. Joining us tonight is the associate legislative director, Janet Carroll. Ms. Carroll, how do you respond to what Ms. Falkenberg just said, that by not doing more to oppose this kind of violence, you and the movement are giving it tacit support?

JANET CARROLL: Well, I'd like to say, first of all, that we're very grateful for this opportunity to again put on the record our opposition to this kind of violence. We have done so over and over again when the opportunity has arisen. Dr. Willke, our president of the National Right-To-Life Organization, as recently as this summer, when these bombings occurred locally, in Washington, D.C., said that we oppose violence of all sorts, the violence inside the clinics as well as the violence outside the clinics. And I don't think that we could be expected to do much more than we have. We have attempted to cooperate in every way possible with those who are now trying to uncover the very difficult process of uncovering who would be involved in this type of situation.

MacNEIL: She also said she thought you could do more in the movement to find out who these people are. How do you feel about that?

Ms. CARROLL: Well, the problem, it seems, is that there has really been no link to the pro-life movement except in those two instances, and even those connections were very peripheral. Just because someone participates in a demonstration, for example, does not mean that they're in any way involved in the organized pro-life movement, and that has been the situation so far. They've arrested eight people in 29 different incidences. Each of those eight individuals wee operating on their own, and they have not been able to make any connection among them.And they have not been able to make any direct connection with an organized organization.

MacNEIL: Is it possible that some people in the wider pro-life movement, frustrated by your inability to stop abortion either through the courts or the Congress, might just have their frustration boil over into more direct action against this? It's a very emotional issue, given to emotional displays, is it not?

Ms. CARROLL: Yes, Coming from our perspective, we realize that 4,000 babies are killed every day by abortion, so obviously there's going to be a certain level of frustration. However, I think that it's significant to point out that for probably the very reason the people that have been involved or have been arrested for these incidents are not involved in the pro-life movement is that they don't realize what progress we actually are making. We have come a long way. We have not been able to stop the killing, but we have substantially increased our majorities in the Congress and we've just made great progress in regulation and we have made -- well, look we just elected the most pro-life president we've ever had by an extremely wide margin with the abortion issue at the forefront of that entire presidential campaign.

MacNEIL: Let me just quote you something that was said on this program last week by Mr. Joe Scheidler, who is head of the Chicago-based group called the Pro-life Action. I'm reading from our transcript. This was a film. It quoted him speaking to a pro-life rally, and he said, "I don't say there aren't occasions when somebody is so infuriated by the murder, the killing that goes on in those places, that they may attack real estate. And I'll tell you, I have yet to shed my first when I see a charred abortion clinic, if nobody was hurt." I'm just wondering whether that doesn't constitute something near encouragement for this kind of action.

Ms. CARROLL: The problem with that is that with every one of these situations there is the possibility of taking more innocent lives, and that is the real tragedy involved in each incident. And it's frightening to all of us.

MacNEIL: So what is your reaction to what Mr. Scheidler said in that quote?

Ms. CARROLL: I think he's not recognizing the dangers involved. Obviously there are differing opinions about the tactics that should be used to end the killing of the unborn children. But there is no difference of opinion in the pro-life movement over whether or not this type of violence should occur.

MacNEIL: I see. Well, thank you. Jim?

LEHRER: Ms. Falkenberg, what do you say to that?

Ms. FALKENBERG: Well, Joe Scheidler travels around the country with the express purpose of teaching people how to close down abortion clinics. And while he says that he does not advocate violence. I think the kind of quotes that you have just heard would demonstrate what an easy step it is from these kind of trainings -- when I was in Florida about six moths ago, at the same time he was having one of these seminars, there were 300 people there from all over the southern part of the country. Now, I think it's a very easy transition fom the non-violent activities to the more violent acitivities.

LEHRER: Do you agree?

Ms. CARROLL: Well, I can only say that we represent the largest pro-life organization in the United States; 50 state organizations make up our own organization. Our spokespersons have always decried this violence and will continue to do so. And in fact Dr. Willke has said that anyone who would involve themself in this type of situation, a violent bombing of this sort, can in no way consider themselves a part of the pro-life movement.

LEHRER: Do these bombings help or hurt your movement?

Ms. CARROLL: I don't they help our movement, nor do they help the movement for abortion. I think that they are absolutely negative in every way.

LEHRER: Do you agree with that, that nobody gets helped by these, Ms. Falkenberg?

Ms. FALKENBERG: Oh, I think that's absolutely right and I think the most frightening part, obviously, for both of us is that if these bombings are not stopped sometime soon, somebody is going to be either dangerously hurt or killed.

LEHRER: Well, tell Ms. Carroll directly what it is that you want her movement to do that you say she's not doing.

Ms. FALKENBERG: Okay. I think that the so-called "pro-life" movement is giving the minimum of condemnation and criticism, and I think pressure could be brought to bear on the more radical elements of that movement. I think that certainly the pro-life movement has more access to President Reagan than we do. I think a strong statement from President Reagan against the terrorism that is going on around the abortion clinics and a strong statement from President Reagan to the FBI that they ought to be involved in this, that it ought to be a high priority and that they ought to bring all the resources that they can bring to bear to stop these acts of violence, would go a long way, and that is no happening.

Ms. CARROLL: Well, the FBI, with Mr. Webster, who heads the FBI, has claimed that they will offer any assistance that the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Agency asks for. At this point they feel that that agency is much better equipped to handle the situation. They in fact have made it their highest priority. They have 500 agents active in the field right now under -- trying to investigate these situations. And the FBI has placed themselves at their disposal. But the ATF, the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Agency has been in this business for about 12 years, and they are best capable of handling the investigation right now.

LEHRER: Ms. Falkenberg, what about Ms. Carroll's additional point a moment ago that there have been, I think you said, eight people arrested in connection with 29 of these bombings and that there is no link between any of the eight? They all were operating as individuals.

Ms. FALKENBERG: That is obviously what the FBI would want us to believe. That is what ATF at this point has indicated. Now, yesterday for the first time Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms said that they are beginning to see the potential for an existence of a so-called secret society, and this is the first time that they have publicly said that. My sense is that the more they get into the investigation, the more they begin to uncover.

LEHRER: Have you heard of anything like a secret society that's dedicated to bombing abortion clinics, Ms. Carroll?

Ms. CARROLL: I've only heard what you have heard through the news. The news that I heard last night said that so far that was confined to the Florida area. They had no reason to suspect that it was more widespread than that.

LEHRER: Has your movement, your organization, made any attempt to find out whether or not such a thing is going on among your members or people on the periphery of your members or anything like that?

Ms. CARROLL: We don't have any type of investigative process going on, of course, but I'm sure that if our people knew who was involved in these things, that they would have made it known to us or to the authorities.

LEHRER: When the FBI or the ATF agents come to people in your organization seeking information, does your leadership tell them to fully cooperate?

Ms. CARROLL: Well, our 50 state organizations are very autonomous, but as far as I know everyone has cooperated fully with the authorities that have come to them. I have heard nothing otherwise.

LEHRER: Do you have any evidence to the contrary, Ms. Falkenberg.

Ms. FALKENBERG: No, no, we don't. I would certainly hope that that is what is occurring. As I said, I think that some public statements along that line, some public statements that say that, while you may have no investigative authority of your own, I mean, I know from our own organization when we sant to seek out some information about things that are going on either in our own movement or in the opposition movement all over the country, that information is attainable. I wouldn't call it a formal investigative procedure, but there is an information-gathering network that exists and that can be brought to bear if the National Right to Life Committee chooses to use it.

Ms. CARROLL: But you know one of the things that has begun to bother me is that the more focus that there has been on these clinic violence attacks, the more occurrences we've had. And I'm very concerned that just giving them the excess attention is not necessarily the right thing to do either.

LEHRER: You're saying that that encourages other people to consider doing it?

Ms. CARROLL: Well, it's a long-debated issue in news.

LEHRER: Oh, I know. You bet.

Ms. CARROLL: But it certainly has seemed to be the case. Over the last year there has been a tremendous focus on it in the press, and as we've seen, the greater focus we've seen, the greater increase in the number of incidents.

LEHRER: What's the alternative to that?

Ms. CARROLL: Oh, I certainly am not suggesting that it shouldn't be reported, but I just think that you can fan the flames.

LEHRER: Do you think it's going to get worse?

Ms. FALKENBERG: I do. We had hoped that the worst of it was occurring during the elections, and that there was some connection. But it certainly has only escalated since the election.

LEHRER: What's your feel for -- about the violence, whether it's is going to get worse?

Ms. CARROLL: I just feel that as long as we have this situation of legal the killing of unborn children -- we've killed 15 million so far since the '73 Supreme Court decision by some of the most painful methods possible -- that there are going to be people out there who are affected enough by that situation that they are going to turn to means other than what you and I would use to correct them, and I can only hope that we can resolve this issue in a more sane way through our political process very soon.

LEHRER: Ms. Carroll, Ms. Falkenberg, thank you both very much.

MacNEIL: Still to come on tonight's NewsHour: we focus on the effort to stop drunk driving with a debate on whether police roadblocks are constitutional. Then a documentary report on a campaign to ban liquor advertising. Next, a tax expert explains the tax changes that take effect today, and finally we look back at 1984 through the eyes of the political cartoonists. Civil Rights Issue: Police Roadblocks

MacNEIL: For our next focus section we move on to the new, nationwide effort to crack down on drunk drivers. In the past year tough new laws were passed raising the penalties for drunk driving, and part of the crackdown involves more police sobriety checkpoints or roadblocks where drivers who appear drunk are asked to take a breathalizer or coordination test. The use of these police roadblocks has been applauded by someas a deterrent, but critics say they're a violation of constitutional rights. We sample that debate tonight with Richard Emery, staff attorney with the New York Civil Liberties Union and Cordell Smith, director of the Colorado Division of Highway Safety. Mr. Smith is in our Denver studio. Mr. Emery, starting with you, why do you oppose this use of roadblocks?

RICHARD EMERY: Well, it seems that every time we have a grave social problem -- and drinking and driving of course is a grave social problem in the United States -- we use the Constitution as a scapegoat, watering down some very cherished right in the Constitution to solve that social problem, even though there are many other ways which do not implicate constitutional rights to do so.

MacNEIL: Well, how does this water down the Constitution?

Mr. EMERY: Well, just think about it. You're sitting in a long line at a roadblock waiting for the police officer to check you out. You're delayed a good deal of time. You're completely innocent. You haven't had one drink. You're waiting there a long time. You get up to the police officer; the police officer sticks his face very close to yours to smell your breath and observe your demeanor, he flashes a flashlight in your car and looks around, and we're getting very close to the kind of situation of checkpoints that we have -- that the world has in Poland, in Paraguay and other totalitarian regimes. The Fourth Amendment, the right not to be searched and seized, protects us from exactly this kind of intrusive police behavior and allows us to be free from any police contact unless the police have a reasonable belief that the particular person they're stopping is suspect. But here hundreds and thousands of people are being stopped even though the police know they're completely innocent.

MacNEIL: Well, let's go to Mr. Smith for his reaction to that one. How do you reply to Mr. Emery?

CORDELL SMITH: I think the rights of the motorist must be considered along with the rights of the other motorists who, in my mind, have a right to travel in a safe and convenient manner. The rights of those that are killed and injured by drunken drivers must also be considered. There are several decisions, some of them by the United States Supreme Court, that establish guidelines for the conduct of DWI checkpoints, and I'm confident when checkpoints are conducted in that manner that they are legal and they are not an undue intrusion on our rights as motorists.

MacNEIL: What are those guidelines?

Mr. SMITH: Some of the guidelines include that the selection of the cars to be stopped must be non-discretionary. The officer conducting the checkpoints at the scene is not to stop the cars at his whim. The cars that are to be stopped should be established by high management levels of the enforcement agency. They either stop every car or, if traffic congestion or pileups begin to occur, they'll stop every third car or every fifth car. In addition, and an equally important guideline that must be maintained is that the degree of intrusion upon the motorist must be kept to a very minimum. So it should be as brief as possible.

MacNEIL: Don't those guidelines protect the rights of motorists?

Mr. EMERY: Well, they don't really. It's very important -- what Mr. Smith said with respect to the right of the driver on the road to live in a safe and drive in a safe environment is a very important point. Nobody can sympathize with a drunk driver. I had a childhood friend killed by a drunk driver. Everybody knows somebody who's been injured by a drunk driver. It's a very serious and obviously deathly problem in our society. But there are other ways of going about it without searching and seizing hundreds of thousands of innocent people at checkpoints, at dragnets, like we're doing here. For instance, I mean, there are a number of better ways to handle the problem.

MacNEIL: What are they?

Mr. EMERY: The most significant that we've hit upon is the social consciousness of drunk driving, that we as a society are going to take individual responsibility not to let our friends, our fellow party-goers, our fellow travelers, go out and drive drunk.We are no longer going to be accomplices to drunk drivers on the road. That's why New Jersey, the Supreme Court in New Jersey, has recently held liable party-givers, hosts and perhaps bar owners for being responsible for those who leave their establishments and go out on the roads. Secondly, a proper use of police resources, focusing on the areas where we can expect drunk drivers -- closings of bars of leaving bars on the roads, areas where traffic naturally, slows, where you might expect drunk drivers, observing for erratic behavior.Those police officers, when they're all piled up at a roadblock, at a sobriety checkpoint, and they're checking out hundreds of thousands of innocent people, are wasting person-power that could be focused very carefully on capturing actual drunk drivers and keeping the roads safer.

MacNEIL: Mr. Smith, what about that?

Mr. SMITH: Well, I think Mr. Emery is right in that social change would be the ideal solution to this. Social change, however, comes slowly, and in my opinion it's going to require some kind of a presence of enforcement to maintain and encourage the continuation of that change.

MacNEIL: What about using the policy to stake out bars at closing time instead of using such a heavy concentration to sift through so many innocent people?

Mr. SMITH: I'm not convinced that staking out bars is a good idea. I think it may be an overstatement to say that there are heavy concentrations of manpower. Checkpoints furnish a very high degree of visibility that supports a general deterrent effect that will discourage people from rationalizing that they can drink and drive and avoid arrest.

MacNEIL: Isn't that true, Mr. Emery, that there is a big deterrent effect of this?

Mr. EMERY: Well, that's in some sense exactly the point, because what we are relying on here is a scare tactic, if you will. It's a very admirable scare tactic. We hope that we could scare all drunk drivers to stay home. But it is an essentially totalitarian method of law enforcement. It's the kind of law enforcement used in Poland, in Paraguay, in other totalitarian countries.

MacNEIL: But those are used in support of laws that we consider politically based, and this is being used in support of a criminal law.

Mr. EMERY: Those are used in support of laws that they argue are for their own security. We are again arguing that these laws are for our security. But, as Thomas Jefferson once said -- I believe it was Jefferson. He said that when we give up civil liberties for the sake of security we lose both. And that's what's happening here.

MacNEIL: As a police officer, Mr. Smith, don't you have -- or public safety officer -- do you have any concern yourself about the constitutionality or the constitutional protections being violated in this method? Are you worried about it at all?

Mr. SMITH: No, I'm not at all worried. In my own mind I reject the use of theterm scare tactic. Enforcement of traffic laws to encourage safe driver behavior has been with us a long time. No one condones driving while drinking. I suspect that few people would think there are any beneficial effects. We just simply don't want people to do that in Colorado.

MacNEIL: Mr. Emery, isn't it true that up 'til now the courts have not supported your position? Right up into the highest court in the state of New York, the court of appeals?

Mr. EMERY: That's correct.

MacNEIL: They've gone against you.

MacNEIL: Well, they've split, but the majority of courts have supported the sobriety checkpoints on a rationale with which I disagree, and that is that they are reasonable under the circumstances.They are looking at reasonableness by balancing deaths on the highways versus this minor intrusion of having a police officer come close to you and shine the light in. They call it a minor intrusion. They are not balancing it against the possibility that watering down the Fourth Amendment, when there are alternatives which are for more effective than these checkpoints available. That watering down the Fourth Amendment might lead to a society the likes of which we would all deplore and worry about.

MacNEIL: Could it, Mr. Smith?

Mr. SMITH: No, I don't think there's been any watering down of the Fourth Amendment. The stopping of motorists is nothing new. It didn't originate with this. States have a valid interest in ensuring that people are able to drive on the roads safely. To pursue that interest, for instance in Colorado, for more than 20 years the enforcement agencies have stopped cars to ensure that the motorists have a legal right to drive, that their drivers' licenses are in good status. They also stop vehicles on the street to see that they are in a fit and proper condition to drive. These kinds of actions are specifically authorized in Colorado law and have been so for more than 20 years.

MacNEIL: I'm sorry to cut into you there. I take the point you were making and we have to end it there. Mr. Smith, thank you very much for joining us from Denver.

Mr. SMITH: Thank you.

MacNEIL: Mr. Emery in New York.

Mr. EMERY: Thank you.

MacNEIL: Jim? Liquor Ads Under Fire

LEHRER: There is more than one way to skin the drunk driver cat, of course, and as a postscript to the roadblock argument we look now at another one over advertising. In this one a movement is working to ban all beer and wine advertising from radio and television on the grounds that it encourages drinking, particularly by young people. It's being argued out all over the country, but most particularly in California. Here's report on that battle we broadcast in September. The reporter is Spencer Michels of public station KQED-San Francisco.

SPENCER MICHELS, KQED [voice-over]: There is little doubt that drinking is increasingly popular among young people, especially beer. It's cheap, easy to get and far and away the drink of choice of American youth. Alcohol is twice as popular as marijuana among teens. It's estimated that over 90% of American kids have tried alcohol by their senior year in high school.

1st YOUTH: We just come down here to enjoy the sunshine, drink our beers, get together with all the girls.

2nd YOUTH: Have a good time.

MICHELS: What grade are you in?

2nd YOUTH: Seventh.

MICHELS: What about in seventh grade? Any kids drink there?

2nd YOUTH: Hell yeah!

MICHELS: Really? What do they drink?

2nd YOUTH: Mostly beer.

MICHELS: And how do you get it?

2nd YOUTH: Some people buy it for us.

MICHELS [voice-over]: There's another chilling statistic about teenaged drinkers. More than half of all fatal accidents involving 15- to 24-year-old drives are alcohol-related. That accounts for 5,000 deaths a year.

1st YOUTH: A friend of mine died, like, about two weeks -- about a month ago.

MICHELS: From what?

1st YOUTH: Drinking and driving. Hurt a lot of people in the car, too. I don't know, it's a pretty wild thing to see all your friends dying from booze, drinking and driving.

ACTOR, TV commercial: Just get in the car.

ACTRESS: I've got to go home.

MICHELS [voice-over]: The alcohol industry has funded ads like this one to help educate teens about the perils of drinking and driving.

ACTOR: You okay to drive?

ACTOR: Yeah, I'm fine.

ACTOR: You sure?

ACTRESS: Relax.

ACTOR: What's a few beers?

NARRATOR [voice-over]: If you don't stop your friend from drinking and driving, you're as good as dead.

MICHELS [voice-over]: But that is not enough, say some critics. They've created Project SMART, a petition drive that will call for the elimination of alcohol ads from radio and TV.

JAMES MOSHER, West Coast Coordinator, Project SMART: Well, Project SMART, the acronym actually stands for Stop Marketing Alcohol on Radio and Television. It's a campaign that was, I'd say, instigated by the Center for Science in the Public Interest in Washington to get petitions to be sent to the President to ban alcohol on radio advertising, on television and radio or, in the alternative, to put counter-advertising on that would balance the message that is going to the public about alcohol and the problems that alcohol can cause.

ANDY MIKASHUS, U.S. Brewers Association: Alcohol products have always had the problem of being singled out as a sinful product by some groups. We feel a little bit with the SMART effort that it's somewhat misguided, that it's not as simple as they see, it's not as black and white as they see. The problems of alcohol and abuse and alcoholism are much more complex than they have laid out simply in the advertising question that they have approached. Most of the ads are positive in nature. There's positive role models in them. You don't see abusive drinking in those commercials. You don't see over-indulgence in those commercials.

L.C. GREENWOOD, ex-defensive end: I've crushed a lot of quarterbacks in my day, and I'm real sorry. So I wrote this letter.

LOUIS WALLACK, Assistant Professor, Public Health, Professor, University of California at Berkeley: I think it's pretty clear that the bulk of beer advertising on TV with the use of sports figures, although they're recently retired, they're still greatly in the public eye. And I think that these are figures that serve as positive role models for youth and that youth strongly identify with. So it's clear to me that the use of these people is a direct effort to capture a market that is at risk for having all kinds of problems by virtue of their being young and growing up.

Mr. MIKASHUS: There has been a number of scholarly reviews of the literature in the last two to three years, and they have just not turned up anything to show that there is a cause relationship, that viewing these advertisements promotes younger people to drink or not.

ARTHUR ASA BERGER, media critic, Annenberg School of Communication: You can't advertise with the notion that it's shaping people's behavior and getting them to do things and then say that it doesn't. The whole advertising industry is based on the notion that somehow or another when people are exposed to these things they're going to be affected by them. And if they're not being affected by them, what are all these people doing? Why do we have a $50-billion advertising industry?

PATRICIA SCHNEIDER, Wine Institute: What we know about advertising is that it really has to do with brand selection. It really can influence whether you drink one chardonnay or another chardonnay. But it's very unlikely to really increase anyone's consumption.

MICHELS [voice-over]: Project SMART's move to ban alcohol ads on TV has garnered the support of the National PTA, the National Council on Alcoholism and other groups.

Mr. MOSHER: The people who are raising questions about their marketing and advertising practices are not saying that this should be an illegal drug, and I don't know of any of the major actors in this who have ever said that. Prohibition didn't work. The effort is to make the industry more responsible in how it handles what is a very dangerous drug in the society, so that we can minimize the problems that it creates.

LEHRER: That report by Spencer Michels of KQED-San Francisco. New Deductions

MacNEIL: Whatever happens to the tax reforms now being considered by the Reagan administration, the nation still has to absorb a lot of tax changes passed in other years that take effect today. We devote out next focus section to explaining them. Judy woodruff has the details.

Judy?

JUDY WOODRUFF: Robin, there is some good news and some bad news for taxpayers in the law changes that become effective today. Taking the bad news first, there is an increase in the Social Security payroll tax rate from 6.7% to a little over 7%. That means for someone earning $25,000 a year, his or her annual taxes will go up $87. Now the good news. There is a new feature called indexing that permits people to escape higher taxes if their wage increases stay at or below the rate of inflation. Until now a pay raise has often pushed people into higher tax brackets. But that will only happen in the future if the pay hike exceeds the rate of inflation. A family of four earning $25,000 a year, for example will save about $50 annually under that new provision.

Here to help us lay out these changes and others in terms that all of us can understand is a man who played a role in the Reagan administration in bringing some of these changes about. He is John Chapton. He was, until a few months ago, assistant secretary of the Treasury for tax policy. He is now an attorney in private practice here in Washington.

Mr. Chapoton, are most people going to feel an overall gain or an overall loss as a result of these Social Security and indexing changes?

Mr. CHAPOTON: The Social Security tax increase does occur in January, as you point out. Both the rate increases, to a little over 7% from 6.7%, and, just as important, the base on which the rate is applied increases from a little over $37,000 to $39,000, $39,800.

WOODRUFF: So you're paying -- the higher the salary --

Mr. CHAPOTON: So you're paying more for people that make, say, $40,000 and above, they will feel both the rate increase and the base increase. At the same time they will enjoy a tax cut, because indexing changes the rate structure from about a four-point difference in the rate structure, a reduction of the rate structure to reflect inflation occuring from September of '84 -- of '83 to September of '85. Higher-income taxpayers probably will be better off, but when you get down in the $20- and $25,000 level it'll be probably a little loss.

WOODRUFF: Is there a cutoff point that you can say? It's around $20-, $30,000?

Mr. CHAPOTON: I haven't run the numbers thoroughly, but, no I'd say it's a little higher than that. I'd say the cut-off is between $35- and $40,000.

WOODRUFF: Below that and you're going to feel the pinch, and above that --

Mr. CHAPOTON: Correct. Below that you'll be a little worse off.

WOODRUFF: Take the Social Security payroll increase first. How much are most people going to feel in the way of an increase? What's the range there?

Mr. CHAPOTON: Well, it's not dramatically significant. At a $20,000 level the Social Security increase would be $70 a year. When you get to the maximum increase, it's a little under $300 a year. So it's not big. But by the same token the indexing is not real large, either. At about the $40,000 range indexing saves about $254 a year.

WOODRUFF: Now, one other thing that's occurring for people who are receiving Social Security benefits for the first time this year, some of those benefits are going to be taxed.

Mr. CHAPOTON: That's correct. For a relatively small portion of the public receiving Social Security benefits, one half of their Social Security will be subject to tax, but only if their other income, including tax-exempt income, is more than $25,000 for a single person and $32,000 for a joint return. If they're over that income level because of other income, then one-half of their Social Security is taxed under the normal income tax rates.

WOODRUFF: All right, what about indexing? Is this really going to make that much of a difference? You mentioned the four points this year. We've got inflation way down.

Mr. CHAPOTON: That's right. Indexing is less important when inflation is way down, but it is a very, very major change because it means that over the years Congress will not enjoy a tax benefit unless it decides to raise taxes. Heretofore Congress has enjoyed -- and the government, both the administration and Congress have enjoyed a benefit from inflation. Inflation goes up one point, tax receipts went up about 1.7%. Now with inflation receipts will reflect only increases in real income, not increases in inflation. A very major change. Amounts to about -- and you look in '88 or so, it amounts to about $45 billion a year.

WOODRUFF: We mentioned the families in the $25,000 range will enjoy, what, $50 a year? What about people who are below that and above that? Does it decrease and increase much beyond that?

Mr. CHAPOTON: No, I think it's going to stay about even with the Social Security change below that, and it'll move -- it'll be a little less below that. It'll move closer to the tax indexing benefit above the $25,000 range.

WOODRUFF: We obviously don't have time to get into all the little changes that are going to take place, but what about some of the things that people who are already thinking about filling out their tax forms this year for 1984, what do they need to be aware of?

Mr. CHAPOTON: Well, for 1984 most of the recent changes which occurred in July of 1984 -- most of those changes are effective next year. I think that the big ones we've already hit on that were the Social Security and the indexing. Starting this year, in tax planning a lot of things changed. I think the big one that we heard most about at Treasury, I believe, is the greater record-keeping requirement for automobiles, for personal-use automobiles. Your personal use does not exceed 50% of the use of the car, no investment tax credit and no accelerated depreciation for the business use of the automobile. And I guess just as important, and somewhat irritating to a lot of taxpayers is you have to keep contemporaneous record of any business use.The means you have to keep a book of some sort in your glove box theoretically, write down the mileage and the business purpose of the trip, and you can tell that doesn't make a lot of people very happy.

WOODRUFF: Doesn't sound like it.What about capital gains? Isn't there a small change there?

Mr. CHAPOTON: The rate stays the same but the holding period is reduced from 12 months to six months with respect to new purchases, assets purchased after mid-year of 1984.

WOODRUFF: There's so much talk around Washington right now about whether we're going to see any real attempt at tax reform. There are a lot of proposals on the table. How would most of those, the Senator Bill Bradley, the one that's come from the Treasury, how would those affect some of these things?

Mr. CHAPOTON: Well, the indexing is retained by the administration proposal, and retained by the Kemp-Kasten proposal; it is dropped in the Bradley-Gephardt proposal. The big point is capital gains under all three proposals would be taxed as ordinary income, so the holding period would not be a factor anymore. Many of the changes, though, in '84 legislation, taxing, dealing with fringe benefits and that type of thing, would be unaffected by any of those tax reform proposals.

WOODRUFF: You're just fresh from the Treasury Department. What do you think the prospects are for some kind of tax reform?

Mr. CHAPOTON: I think it will be difficult. I think it has no chance unless the President gets behind it strongly and personally. If he does I think it's got a chance.

WOODRUFF: All right, think you, John Chapoton, for being with us.

Mr. CHAPOTON: Thank you, Judy.

WOODRUFF: Jim?

LEHRER: Finally tonight, we have resisted until right now the natural journalistic inclination to focus backward on the year that just was, to look in retrospect and with wisdom at the events, ideas and other heavy items that made up the year 1984. Be thankful that we finally chose the following way to do it. Poking Fun, 1984

ANNOUNCER [Wasserman cartoon, Los Angeles Times Syndicate]: Don't miss the next episode of "As the Polls Turn."

Soap Opera NARRATOR [referring to Gary Hart]: Is America seriously involved with a younger man or will she find happiness with her former number two? Who is the legitimate son of FDR? What did this man [Dan Rather with exit poll] find out and when? Tune in every Tuesday, every week, practically forever.

Pres. RONALD REAGAN, [Wasserman cartoon]: George, Jesse Jackson is making the U.S. look foolish and confusing the world about our foreign policy. Does he have the right to do that?

GEORGE SHULTZ, Secretary of State: No, sir. That's your job!

WALTER MONDALE, during campaign [Brookins cartoon, Richmond Times Dispatch, News American Syndicate]: Reagan is anti-women. On the other hand, in my search for a running mate I am interviewing and considering several women.

REPORTER: But, Mr. Mondale, President Reagan has two women in his cabinet and he appointed the first woman to the Supreme Court.

Mr. MONDALE: Yeah, but he was playing politics!

Pres. REAGAN, at cabinet table emptied by Burford, Watt, Donovan departures [Benson cartoon, The Arizona Republic, Tribune Media Services]: It's lonely at the top.

Mr. MONDALE, thinking [Toles cartoon, The Buffalo News, Universal Press Syndicate]: In the 1980 debate Reagan walked over and shook Carter's hand. This surprised and embarrassed Carter on national TV. Well, he won't surprise and embarrass me on national TV.

Pres. REAGAN, withdrawing his hand: Heh, heh. I guess I win. Oh, wait. There's still the talking part. Central America

Pres. REAGAN [Bill Day cartoon, The Commercial Appeal]: Well, Henry, what should we do about Central America?

HENRY KISSINGER: Let's buy it.

Pres. REAGAN [Bill Day cartoon]: Are you sure American civilians aren't illegally fighting alongside you Nicaraguan contras?

SOLDIER: Si.

SOLDIER: Si.

SOLDIER: Si.

SOLDIER: Si:

SOLDIER: Yup!

JOSE NAPOLEON DUARTE, President of El Salvador [Wasserman cartoon]: As the new president of El Salvador I promise to bring this nation peace, justice, reform, freedom and a democracy. If that's okay with you guys [to generals].

CIA PRIMER, being read to contras [Benson cartoon]: See Juan. See Pedro. See Juan and Pedro plan the assassination of the nasty Sandinista leaders. Kill, Juan! Kill, Pedro. Kill! Kill! Kill!

Pres. REAGAN, trailing bomb with loose rope [Margulies cartoon, Houston Post, King Features]: Go on, Nicaragua. Heh, heh, heh. Make my day! Middle East

Pres. REAGAN, [S. Kelley cartoon, San Diego Union, Copley News Service]: Secretary Shultz and I wish to announce a major change in our Mideast policy.

Sec. SHULTZ: We've decided to have one.

GENERAL [Margulies cartoon]: The U.S. is not giving up on Lebanon. We're having it towed to Central America.

AMERICAN OFFICIAL, to Moslem terrorist tracking mud on U.S. flag [S. Kelley cartoon]: Oh, yeah? Well, if you cross that next line, I'm going to get really, really, really mad! Soviet Union

ANNOUNCER, Moscow TV [Brookins cartoon]: President Chernenko's reappearance dispels rumors of ill health.Back to you, Ivan.

CHERNENKO AIDES: Quick! Get him out of the sun. The wax is melting!

Pres. REAGAN, in jungle of missiles [Benson cartoon]: Dr. Gromyko, I presume?

ANDREI GROMYKO, Soviet Foreign Minister, laughing with aides at negotiations table across from Reagan and aides [Willis cartoon, The Dallas Times Herald]: So then Konstantin says we're outlawing the U.S. ! Bombing begins in five minutes!

Sec. SHULTZ [Margulies cartoon]: Efforts to meet the Soviets face to face are stalled over very technical issues.

REPORTER: Such as?

Sec. SHULTZ: Chernenko's pacemaker causes static on Reagan's hearing aid. And . . .

TAXPAYER, reading fairytale [Toles cartoon]: They've simplified the tax code, eliminating deductions and shelters without causing anyone to pay more. And eliminating the deficit.And they all lived happily ever after.

CHILD: Is Washington a real place, Dad?

TAXPAYER: What do I tell him?

CONGRESS [S. Kelley cartoon]: Hey, want to see what we plan to do about the runaway cost of entitlement programs? [does magic trick] Want to see it again?

TV ANNOUNCER, with Olympic hero [Wasserman cartoon]: Jim, I'm here with one of the true heroes of these games, and we'll talk with him as soon as he catches his breath. He's turned in a truly inspired, record-breaking performance. He's watched 178 1/2 of a possible 180 hours of our Olympic coverage.

ANNOUNCER, doing crop report [Margulies cartoon]: Texas still plagued by last winter's freeze, Florida's citrus wracked by cancer disease while the Pentagon enjoys a record harvest of lemons.

Pres. REAGAN [Wasserman cartoon]: It's simple.We bring down the rate of increase in spending while economic growth pushes up the rate of revenues. Where the two lines meet is a balanced budget. Just act like nothing's wrong.

THE TIN MAN, in Dr. William DeVries' office [S. Kelley cartoon]: "Just to register emotion, jealousy, devotion and really feel a part. I could stay young and chipper and I'd lock it with a zipper if I only had a heart."

NARRATOR [Toles cartoon]: One day in 1997 . . .

BYSTANDER: What about the health warning?

MACHINE, to cigarette buyer: Cancer, you imbecile! CANCER. Do you hear? Cancer?[slaps buyer]

BUYER: Oh, you don't notice it after awhile.

BYSTANDER: Why do you buy them from that machine?

BUYER: The big guy at the deli is worse!

MacNEIL: Once again the main stories of the day. President Reagan called in Secretary of State Shultz and Secrtary of Defense Weinberger to talk about strategy in the Geneva arms talks next week.Moscow sounded optimistic about prospects for the talks, and the Pope called upon both sides to negotiate in a human and moral way.

Good night, Jim.

LEHRER: Good night, Robin. And we'll see you tomorrow night. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.