Shrinking Inner Circle

Thomas Mann, Under Secretary of State for Economic Affairs, submitted his resignation last week to his friend and fellow Texan in the White House.

After 24 years as a State Department careerist, Mann, 53, intends to take a long rest and write a book. If it .resembles his career, the book should be hard-hitting, controversial and influential.

Born in Laredo, Mann spoke border Spanish--"Tex-Mex"--almost as soon as he spoke English and acquired a lifelong fondness for the neighboring Mexicans and the Latin temperament. All but two years of his State Department service were spent in Latin America or on Latin American affairs. He was ambassador to Mexico when Lyndon Johnson succeeded to the presidency, soon became Assistant Secretary for Inter-American Affairs and the Administration's "one voice on all matters affecting this hemisphere." Last year he was promoted to Under Secretary and the Department's No. 3 man, after Dean Rusk and Under Secretary George Ball.

Bluntly candid, Mann was known as a hard-liner on Latin American affairs. He himself insisted, "I am a pragmatist, not a dogmatist," but was criticized for his disapproval of some left-wing but non-Communist Latin regimes, his rigorous criteria for economic aid and determined promotion of free enterprise in developing countries. Criticism failed to deter him, however, and his resignation indicates neither a shift in Administration Latin policy nor a disagreement at the top.

The President reluctantly accepted two other resignations from the Administration's inner circle last week:

P: Jack Valenti, 44, quit as a White House aide to become the $150,000-a-year (plus expenses) president of the Motion Picture Association of America. Valenti, a former Texas adman whom

Johnson brought back from Dallas with him on Nov. 22, 1963, soon won fame of sorts as the President's most ardent public drumbeater ("I sleep each night a little better because Lyndon Johnson is my President") and as a master of purple-hued prose. He is also, it seems, a tolerably knowledgeable history buff, gushed almost as effusively over Historian Thomas Macaulay in last week's Saturday Review as he ever did over Lyndon Johnson.

P: George Reedy, 48, former White House Press Secretary and senior member of the Johnson staff, resigned to become vice president in charge of planning for Struthers Wells Corp., a firm based in Warren, Pa., that specializes in the techniques of putting heat to efficient use. Despite an efficient performance as Johnson's press secretary when he was in the Senate, Reedy was ruffled by the grueling pace of his White House duties and, after an operation last year, settled down in a quiet office in the East Wing where he worked on long-range studies for the President.

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