Time Out

The men who want to talk serious business about crises, conferences and tax cuts come and go through the west entrance. But 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is also a home as well as a White House, and last week the joint was jumping.

A high point of the week was the fifth concert of Jackie Kennedy's series of musical programs for young people. On hand in the East Room were 220 kids from ten to 19, mostly the sons and daughters of Administration officials, ambassadors and chiefs of diplomatic missions. Jazzman Paul Winter, 23, clutched his alto sax, gave three foot beats, and led his sextet into Bells and Horns, The Ballad of the Sad Young Men and Pony Express. The style was somewhere between Dixieland and progressive, and it seemed to bewilder some of the young folks. But it really sent Jackie. Afterward she confided to Pianist Warren Bernhardt: "I could hardly keep from wiggling around like you on the piano bench." Said she to Leader Winter: "That was wonderful. Simply wonderful. We've never had anything like it here." Said Winter of Jackie's tribute: "That knocked us out."

As cultural wagon boss on the New Frontier, Jackie, escorted by Arthur Schlesinger Jr., also took in the opening of an exhibit of South American paintings at the Pan American Union, and in a zebra-patterned suit seemed to have an edge on the paintings themselves.

Then it was off to Hyannisport, with about two dozen other Kennedys and Kennedy kinfolk, for Thanksgiving Day. The children ate in the afternoon, then saw movies in Old Joe Kennedy's 40-seat theater; the grown Kennedys feasted at 7 p.m. on a 32-lb. turkey. Only two things marred the occasion: little John Jr. had been left back at the White House with a bad cold, and fog and a cold rain weathered out the family's annual Thanksgiving Day touch football game.

Reflecting the relaxed mood of the Kennedys, the White House at week's end released a fetching photograph taken last month of Caroline and John Jr. romping about the President's office, with Daddy applauding their antics from the sidelines.

Last week the President also:

> Commuted the sentences of six federal prisoners and issued full pardons to five others--including Matthew J. Connelly, 55, former appointments secretary to President Truman. Connelly was convicted of tax-fraud conspiracy, paroled in 1960 after serving six months, and is now a public relations man in New York.

> Instructed the Veterans Administration to pay out $327,600,000 in Government life insurance dividends in January, rather than spreading the payments throughout 1963. Such a move, said the President, should "provide a needed boost to the economy."

> Granted the Senate Foreign Relations Committee authority to review the tax returns from 1950 through 1960 of individuals or firms representing foreign governments in the U.S. The committee has been investigating the influence of lawyers, lobbyists and public relations firms on U.S. policies and lawmaking.

>Ordered, in a final burst of holiday spirit, a four-day Christmas weekend with full pay for all federal employees not needed for duty on Monday, Dec. 24.

> Reappointed Robert Morgenthau, unsuccessful Democratic candidate for Governor of New York, to the post of U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York--the job Morgenthau quit nearly three months ago to make the sacrificial race against Nelson Rockefeller.

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