To the Editors:

The Equal Rights Amendment [July 12] did not die; it was temporarily delayed. In the words of Susan B. Anthony: "Failure is impossible."

Steven A. Silva

San Diego

So Phyllis Schlafly is happy about the ERA'S defeat. She is proud to deny rights to less fortunate women who have only what they can earn. Schlafly is the modern Marie Antoinette. What we needed was a Joan of Arc.

Nancy E. Urmston

Tipton, Ind.

For too long too many women have remained apathetic about the rights of their sex. I was one of those who sat back and watched others do the work for me when I should have taken an active role. Apathy killed ERA.

Mildred Wells Sample

Albany, Ga.

Your cover caption "The Climb to Equity" ought to have read "The Climb to Equity" The implication of the word equality is that women are looking upward, straining to be equal to men. We've always been equal. It is equity we seek and must have to survive in this society.

Mallory Millett Jones

New York City

The history of the pro-ERA movement is replete with excesses that demonstrate contempt for the democratic process. Consider a precedent-setting time extension for ratification, boycotts, hunger strikes, bags of animal blood, to name a few. And now we hear of raising millions to "get strong and get even." This approach resembles government by extortion. The ERA supporters appear more dangerous to the nation than the presumed inequality between the sexes.

Murray Howden

Allentown, Pa.

The death of ERA was caused by its radical advocates who sought not so much to equate as to castrate.

Thomas M. Edwards

San Francisco

Mrs. Schlafly beat the ERA not because she played "to people's worst fears" but because she had the best argument. Equal rights would be balanced by equal responsibility, and that would obliterate women's traditional privileges, including exemption from the draft.

(The Rev.) Maurice Fitzgerald

Washington, D.C.

Feverish Health Costs

The ultimate solution to the nation's health-care woes [July 12] must come not from Washington, as you suggest, but from the people. They alone have the power to stop smoking, lose weight, shun fatty foods, drink less, avoid accidents, exercise regularly and manage stress as productively as possible. After all, burning less gasoline, among other conservation measures, brought down the price of fuel.

Frank Welsh, M.D.

Cincinnati

Your article correctly diagnoses ultra-modern technology as the primary cause of increasing medical-care costs. Yet as long as consumers demand the very best and consider anything less as malpractice, the situation will not change.

John T. Harris, M.D.

Portland, Ore.

Chocolate Chic

As a lawyer who is also a chocolate addict [July 12], I was intrigued by Anthropologist Jennie Keith's suggestion that chocolate may be used to get someone in your power. If this is true, the possibilities are limitless. Rather than arming myself with lawbooks and briefs the next time I must face a hostile opposing counsel, grumpy judge of recalcitrant witness, I might just fill my briefcase with Hersey Golden Almond bars.

Amy Zapp

Enola, Pa.

Nowhere in your story was it made clear that chocolate is a potent source of caffeine and that chocolate addicts are probably caffeine addicts. The effects of excessive prolonged consumption of caffeine on the human body remain controversial, but one is led to wonder if consumers of chocolate may eventually suffer from taking in so much caffeine.

Lovett P. Reddick, M.D.

Kingsport, Tenn.

Sleuths

Regarding your article "Worsening Labor Pains" [July 5] about Raymond Donovan, I find it regrettable and disappointing that TIME has chosen to print the uncorroborated belief of unnamed Capitol Hill sources that I have acted as a "talent scout" for the Schiavone Construction Co. in its hunt for sleuths. There can be no corroboration for such a belief because it is untrue.

It is even more regrettable that your story leaves the impression that I acted as a middleman between the White House and the Schiavone Co. in the hiring of detectives. This is also untrue.

Finally your characterization of me as a "private detective" is misleading. Actually I am president of a management consulting firm, which advises clients such as law firms and corporations on internal security, fraud, embezzlement and protection of assets.

Philip R. Manuel, President

The Philip Manuel Resource Group Ltd.

Falls Church, Va.

TIME stands by its story.

Modern Monks

In the early '60s I visited Weston Priory [July 12]. It was a simple, stark place. So much so that one of my companions remarked sarcastically, "There is nothing to do here look north, south, east or west." The brothers have done more than look in the four directions. They have taken in a 1,600-year-old form of monastic life and given it new direction.

(The Rev.) John C. Massion

Niles, III.

During its early years, I was a novice at the Weston Priory. I can testify that this monastery was most traditional in every way. It is sad that the brothers are now so far out. Monks can offer more by being faithful to a life of prayer than by dancing around a newly planted Japanese dogwood tree in Central Park.

(The Rev.) Bernard Grunewald

Mill Creek, W. Va.

Priestly Romances

Father Andrew Greeley [July 12] will never change. He will continue to write about the Catholic Church, which is made up of people who possess, like the rest of the world, vices, desires and the need to be forgiven. The Catholic Church can only benefit from his work.

Patricia B. Logsdon

Sylvania, Ohio

If the Catholic Church collapses, the cause will come from within its own ranks. No one is better suited to start this schism than Andrew Greeley.

Carmella Quinn

Holiday, Fla.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.