Fiendish

Sir:

You fiends! ". . . The only known instance in which a Harvard professor committed murder" [TIME, July 26].

The fine hand of some Yaleman.

T. D. RYAN Chicago Heights, Ill.

P: No--handmade at Harvard. In 1850, speaking of Professor John White Webster, who was convicted and hanged, Harvard's President Jared Sparks said: "Our professors do not often commit murder."--ED.

Pink & White Facade

Sir:

. . . Your article, "The Pink Facade" [TIME, Aug. 2], on the Communist puppet show in Philadelphia should be required reading for every American. TIME presented the real news of the Progressive Party's convention in telling how naive a group of sincere Americans can be in the face of Communist management . . .

WM. L. COLLINS Pittsburgh, Pa.

City Room Routine

Sir:

In the section of TIME devoted to the press [July 19], reference was made to certain changes in the city room of the New York Times. Your article stated, among other things, that Assistant Managing Editor Turner Catledge had been moved up to acting managing editor to "replace" Edwin L. James who sailed the week before for a vacation in Europe. Some who have read this have assumed this was a permanent change instead of the normal routine of replacing the chief executive when he is on a vacation. Mr James and Mr. Catledge have been close associates for many years and their positions remain unchanged.

ARTHUR HAYS SULZBERGER New York City

The Bird

Sir:

. . . The Carl Milles sculpture located in the lobby of the TIME & LIFE Building . . . was not mentioned in the article on this fine sculptor [TIME, July 19.].

Surely someone on the staff has heard the tiny silver bird in the sculpture group mark the hour by its song. Perhaps you object to being given the bird every hour on the hour.

JOHN ALLEN Jackson Heights, N.Y.

P: It gets monotonous.--ED.

Ticket Taker

Sir:

Your Aug. 2 Miscellany item about Al G. Moriarty (police had been looking for him for two years, found and arrested him when he announced his candidacy for the general assembly) failed to explain Moriarty's offense: since May 1946 he had received 14 tickets for illegal parking and had ignored them all. Having now paid a fine of $42, he is free and clear to pursue his political career.

WILLIAM ROWLAND Atlanta, Ga.

P: TIME admires Motorist Moriarty's Irish spirit, gladly rights the record. --ED.

Hallowed Preserve

Sir:

The statement in TIME, July 19, that "Before the war Indonesia was the hallowed preserve of Dutch and British traders and cartels (notably tin and rubber), which all but shut out U.S. business" grievously slanders the Dutch. Before the war an unlimited number of U.S. firms could have had, and very many did have (amongst others, Goodyear and Standard Oil), vast and growing enterprises in Indonesia . . . thanks to the model open door policy of the Dutch government which welcomed all enterprises, including Japanese . . .

JAC BLOM Rotterdam, Holland

P: Reader Blom has a point, but he is overenthusiastic about it. Prewar U.S. investments in Indonesia, which amounted to $86.3 million (State Department's estimate), were small potatoes compared to Dutch ($1,900 million) and British ($200 million) holdings.--ED.

Irish Confetti

Sir:

. . . Once in a while you come through with a piece that compels me to shift the gears in my Adam's apple before I can swallow it. One such is the item on Eire, "Border Raid" [TIME, July 26].

What perversity is it that compels [you] to write such . . . slanderous drivel . . . ?

Alton, Ill. W. CROKE

Sir:

"Border Raid" is pure genius. Real Ireland, real people and reactions, real humor--in 313 words! ... A masterpiece . . .

MRS. R. J. BEAMISH Harrisburg, Pa.

Abstinence & Agape

Sir:

I feel impelled to comment on some of the implications in the article "Gloomy Dane" [TiME, July 26] . . .

Dr. Ellerman's statistics [and] his conclusions, on Copenhagen's alcoholics . . . are inapplicable to those alcoholics in New Castle County, Del., who appear before me in "The Family Court" . . .

They are for the most part . . . intelligent and sensitive persons who are afflicted not so much with "a lack of moral responsibility" as with alcoholism, a baffling and tremendously difficult disease.

It can, however, in most cases be arrested. The ingredients of the required court treatment are 1) total abstinence from intoxicating liquor . . . 2) infinite patience and understanding guidance . . . 3) what the ancient Greeks called agape* . . . The Wilmington chapter of Alcoholics Anonymous works in close cooperation with The Family Court . . .

Instead of 79% of recidivism, as Dr. Ellerman says is the case among the Saint Hans Mental Hospital patients, about 60% of the alcoholics who come before me and who express a willingness to accept the court's help eventually become total abstainers.

As to whether . . . alcoholics should be . . . "left entirely without treatment," I would most respectfully refer you to the once miserable, now happy wives & children of the alcoholics who have been helped.

ELWOOD F. MELSON Wilmington, Del.

Efficacy & the Old Law

Sir:

May I call your attention to a misleading sentence, in your Aug. 2 issue, in an otherwise excellent summary of an article on psychological analysis and confession by the Rev. Victor White, O.P.?

With the aim of saving space, no doubt, certain words or phrases were deleted so that Father White was made to say that there is "no foregone reason why the theologian can deny to dream-symbolism the . . . efficacy he must allow to the sacraments . . ."

In his original Commonweal article Father White not only qualified "efficacy" but his reference was explicitly to "the sacraments of the Old Law . . ." Father White does not believe that psychological analysis has the same efficacy as the Sacraments.

EDWARD S. SKILLIN Editor Commonweal New York City

*Brotherly love.

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