Russell & Rights

Sir: America is fortunate in having a man like Senator Richard B. Russell in Washington. Although he was born in Georgia--and that automatically makes him a Southerner--his thinking is strictly 20th century and all-American.

NELL HARRIS KIRKLEY Atlanta

Sir: Why classify Russell as a wise old scholar and Eastland and Talmadge as racists? They're three of a kind, right down the line. Can all this ridiculous hullabaloo be masking the deep paranoid fear of the Southern whites that, given equal rights, the Negro might attempt to rectify generations of persecution ?

C. J. HEPBURN Diamond Point, N.Y.

Sir: Your story on Senator Richard Russell and the South's fight on the so-called civil rights bill was, in TIME'S fashion, just one more sermon for compulsory integration--not so effective a sermon, however, as your picture of Manhattan's integrated teen-age gangsters was in support of Senator Russell and segregation.

CHARLES DELANEY New York City

Sir: Your article gives me more credit than I deserve and is therefore all the more appreciated. In justice to my father, who was one of the greatest men I have ever known, I must comment on your references to him. It is true that he lost campaigns for Congress, for the Senate, and twice for the governorship. However, he was never appointed judge. He had served as solicitor general of the old western circuit, one of the largest in Georgia, before I was born. He was consistently elected to judicial office, including judge of the Superior Court, chief judge of the Court of Appeals, and chief justice of the Supreme Court of Georgia, which position he occupied at the time of his death.

Judges did not receive very handsome salaries in those days. Dad did not care a great deal about money, but he was determined that all of his 13 children should have an opportunity to attend college. While serving as chief judge of the Court of Appeals, five of his children were in college at the same time. All of us had been trained in economy, but he soon found that he was running into debt. He therefore resigned in 1916 and reestablished his law practice. He was successful in eight years in discharging his obligations and accumulating a little. Desiring to return to the bench, he offered for chief justice of the Supreme Court of Georgia and was elected by an overwhelming majority. His numerous decisions illustrate his great judicial ability. It is not possible in a letter of reasonable length to go into his many fine qualities or to deal with the reasons why he did not achieve his political ambitions other than as judge.

RICHARD B. RUSSELL Washington, D.C.

All in the Family

Sir: I was interested in your July 29 story on Artist Fretwell's Holy Family in modern dress and Reader Afton Wynn's later comments on primitive paintings of the Madonna (with an Indian face) on the walls of Mexican churches. Why shouldn't a Christ, a Madonna or angels look like Indians or Negroes, or whatever? Great medieval artists represented members of the Holy Family in clothes of the artist's own period. Christ can appear in all shapes to all men.

H. A. ADAMS New York City

P: For a sample of Mexican religious art--an Indian angel in Tonantzintla, Puebla--see cut.--ED.

Despair in Heaven

Sir: Cheers for the rib-tickling account [July 29] of the ''unquenchable American millions" on the vacation trails. High taxes, inflation and cockeyed court decisions notwithstanding, TIME has used some good belly laughs to remind us pointedly and seriously that the U.S.A. is a little bit of heaven.

ROBERTA SEVERTSON KAAN South Pasadena, Calif.

Sir: Your "Summer 1957" reveals how great and widespread is the "unconscious despair" of mankind in the U.S.A. Walden Pond, like Thoreau, goes the way of all flesh. But the spirit which Thoreau nourished grows on.

WILLARD R. CLARK Howe, Ind.

Sir: You aptly describe the family man on vacation in summer 1957, but Henry David Thoreau did it better: "The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation."

HARRY W. MCDANIEL Major, U.S. Army Marshall, Texas

Letters from the Editors

Sir: I don't see how your piece [Aug. 12] on newspapers' coverage of business, citing some of the top business writers, could have overlooked the Akron Beacon Journal's Joseph E. Kuebler. While an expert on the rubber industry, and a man to whom the rubber company officials will talk, he is quite a reporter in other fields of industry.

BEN MAIDENBURG Executive Editor Akron Beacon Journal Akron

Sir: In your fine piece about newspaper business editors you say, "Business news is frequently entrusted to a shaky old hand . . . ' Ken Hand, the widely read business edit of the Dallas Morning News, is neither "shaky" nor "old."

EDWARD COPE Houston

SIR: HAVE TWO HIGHLY COMPETENT FULL-TIME REPORTERS ON ARIZONA BUSINESS, HOMES AND EXPANDING ELECTRONICS ACTIVITIES. UNAPPRECIATE WISECRACK OF UNNAMED SO-CALLED PHOENIX REPORTER ABOUT BUSINESS BEAT. MY DOG EDITOR IS HAPPY IN HIS WORK, TOO.

ORIEN W. FIFER JR. MANAGING EDITOR ARIZONA REPUBLIC PHOENIX, ARIZ.

Houston v. the World

Sir: I was shocked to read of the action taken by the Houston school board in eliminating world geography and history from the grade school curriculum [Aug. 5]. We like to feel that our educational system seeks to present the unbiased truth, and to prepare student's to face life realistically. The Houston school system has deliberately rejected these aims. I fear for democracy if others follow this abominable course.

LAURA E. HILL Pittsburgh

Sir: For generations the outside world has been forced to listen to Texans tell of how much bigger things are in their native land than elsewhere. Now they may add idiocy to their list.

R. B. GRIFFITHS Modesto, Calif.

One Good Curtsy Deserves . . .

Sir: We note that at Queen Elizabeth's recent garden party in London, Mrs. Earl Warren, under protocol, curtsied to the Queen. May we hope that when the Queen comes to Washington she will curtsy to the wife of the Chief Justice of the U.S.A.?

H. J. KINGSBURY La Jolla, Calif.

Designs of Beauty

Sir: What a splendid article you had in your Aug. 5 issue on Europe's plazas. It is amazing and certainly very encouraging to find that your magazine is interested in this subject. It is of very real importance to current American development, especially in view of the tremendous program supported by federal funds for urban renewal.

EDMUND N. BACON Executive Director City Planning Commission of Philadelphia

Sir: The color pictures are simply wonderful. However, the "morning sun" in St. Peter's Square is in truth an "afternoon sun," since the church's faqade fronts east.

ANDREW J. BAUMANN Milan

P:TIME saw the wrong light.--ED.

To Help Children

Sir: The grandmother of two little girls with cystic fibrosis thanks you for your Aug. 5 article on the disease.

RUTH M. POINDEXTER West Hartford, Conn.

Sir: We have not forgotten that TIME [March 1, 1954] was the first national magazine to describe cystic fibrosis--the "new" disease --to lay people. Your recent story is a very competent exposition of the latest advances made by research in this disease. On behalf of the Greater New York-Northern New Jersey Chapter of the National Cystic Fibrosis Research Foundation--our heartfelt thanks.

THOMAS A. ROTHWELL President New York City

Delinquent G.I.'s

Sir: Concerning your Aug. 5 story on Airman Donald Wheeler: The armed forces are chicken; they daren't enforce orders. But should they try, get a pressagent to whip up a frenzied campaign to save you from discipline. Carry your case to the public through press, radio, and courier where necessary. You'll win if you whine and weep. My nomination for our next "National Hero": Airman Donald Wheeler.

BUCK DAVIDSON Superior, Wis.

Sir: What we should be concerned about is the depths to which military discipline has fallen. The fact of the matter is--Wheeler refused to obey a lawful order given him by a superior. If every soldier, sailor, marine or airman suddenly decided to disobey an order, the U.S. would be in a hell of a fix. The people of this country have a choice: A disciplined, effective military establishment or a rabble consisting of graduated juvenile delinquents, with Elvis Presley haircuts.

CHARLES S. STOUGH JR. Major, U.S.A. Centereach, N.Y.

Sir: Your account of Wheeler's trip to Tokyo --"I am thinking of being circumcised as a health measure" and that he stopped off at a brothel--can hardly be anything but poor taste. If you have no regard for family and friends back home, at least don't make us cringe for you.

D. C. MALMQUIST Chicago

P: Any old (or new) soldier will recognize the oldest goldbricking dodge in uniform--"circumcision as a health measure."--ED.

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