To the Editor:

Re "California's Governor Plays Tough on Crime" ( news article, May 23 ): The marginal success of Gov.  Gray Davis's zero tolerance crime policies underscores the dangers of a government that cedes the power of discretion in deference to public demand for law and order.

As crime in California, and all of the United States, continues at levels that shock most of the industrialized world, one wonders how treating 14-year-old suspects as adults, requiring life sentences for minor felonies and denying due process to prisoners can be justified.

Criminals can be punished without enacting the draconian, one-size-fits-all policies that are gradually making the Unites States look more like the Singapore that Mr.  Davis evokes.

GARY R.  WESTHOFF Bronxville, N.Y., May 23, 2000