On the Record

The semisecret John Birch Society has long had a rule against issuing official statements on issues of public policy. Last week that rule was broken when 22 members of the society's 25-man governing council, meeting in Manhattan at the Harvard Club, put forth a pronouncement deploring "intervention by the United States Government, in collusion with the United Nations, to destroy by armed force the independence of Katanga."

"This action," said the Birchers, "betrays many fundamental principles of our Republic and goes counter to precedents repeatedly established in respect to countries smaller both in area and population . . . [Katanga President] Tshombe and his people are a Christian, anti-Communist nation friendly to us. They are fighting to establish a free constitutional representative republic."

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