Assemblyman Tom Hayden

With respect to vicious attacks on Assemblyman Tom Hayden by showboating politicians I offer a quote by H. L. Mencken: "Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under." Tom Hayden's only crime is that he understood long before the rest of the country that the war in Vietnam should never have happened. How long should he be punished for having the vision before the majority? LINDA FELDMAN Woodland Hills

Likening it to a soldier's duty in battle, Orange County Assemblyman Gil Ferguson was gearing up for his long-promised effort to oust Assemblyman Tom Hayden from the Legislature for supposedly traitorous conduct during the long-ended U. S. military conflict in Vietnam. "It is like having to land in the morning at 0:500," said Ferguson, a freshman assemblyman from Newport Beach. "You wish you didn't have to do it. But you can't go over the hill."

Assemblyman Tom Hayden was elected by the voters of the 44th Assembly District because he campaigned vigorously and spoke clearly and honestly to the issues we faced in the 44th as well as those issues that affect us statewide. He was reelected to that same office by those same voters, plus many more, who were pleased by his diligence in pursuing those goals and objectives we deemed important. Obviously, the majority of voters in the 44th Assembly District approve of his performance as assemblyman and respect him as a man of integrity--self-serving attacks from the political right not withstanding.

I read with great interest Assemblyman Tom Hayden's article (Editorial Pages, June 24), "Running Short of Good Teachers." United Teachers-Los Angeles concurs with Hayden's opinion that the teacher shortage at this time is at drastic proportions and will get increasingly worse over the years. The Los Angeles Unified School District is projecting a teacher shortage of about 3,000 for the 1985-86 school year. The average teacher age in Los Angeles is 52, and there will be massive retirements in the L.A. school system within the next five years.

It appalls me to see a supposedly responsible, rational legislator such as Assemblyman Gil Ferguson (R-Newport Beach) demonstrate such prejudicial, irrational and unthinking behavior as when he labled Assemblyman Tom Hayden (D-Santa Monica) a "traitor" for his stand on the Vietnam War (Times, May 3). Such slanders are nothing more than McCarthyism at its worst. In so many words, what Ferguson said was, "If you hold an opinion that differs from mine, then you are not only wrong, but anti-American, anti-God and probably unfit to be a citizen of this country."