Religion & the Campaign
Sir:
Call me Ishmael* if you like, but this Protestant will vote for Kennedy. I would like to get the word around that one does not have to embrace the Catholic faith to vote for him. There are some who reject the doctrine of the infallibility of the Pope but accept the doctrine of the infallibility of Ike without batting an eyelash.
MRS. C. L. VINCENT Corinth, Ky.
Sir:
The word bigotry appears so often in the political campaign that I am curious to know the difference between bigotry and toleration. Any unfavorable comment on the Roman Catholic Church appears to be bigotry. The constant Roman refrain of the oldest church, the one true church, the only church founded by our Lord Jesus Christ, "Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus" ("outside the church no salvation"), appears to be toleration.
(THE REV.) FRANCIS F. E. BLAKE Memorial Chapel of the Holy Communion Philadelphia
Sir:
I see that the president of the firm of Jesus, Inc., Norman Vincent Peale, has identified himself with a group of other bigots questioning the right of a Catholic to be President.
I'm both a Republican and Catholic and have no intention of voting for Kennedy unless Peale and his ilk choose to make religion an issue. Then Kennedy will get my vote if only for pure sympathy.
L. R. SAMUELS Columbus
Sir:
Having just seen and read accounts of John Kennedy's "historic" meeting with anti-Catholic factions in Houston, I was appalled at the lack of ability with which the issue was handled. No one bothered to state the crucial point of the whole matter--that the Pope claims infallibility (as any parochial school third-grader can tell you) only in matters of faith and morals. Any pronouncements he might make about American Government or politics would certainly command respect and evaluation, but no more or less than the pronouncements of other learned men throughout the world.
JAMES COLEMAN Lathrup Village, Mich.
Sir:
And now American Protestants have staged their own Inquisition, Texas style, Houston 1960: about 300 brave, "patriotic" Protestant ministers ganged up on one lone Catholic, Senator Kennedy. Bravo, America! What grist for the mill, presented on a silver platter to Mr. Khrushchev on his arrival at the U.N.
AMELIA URBANO Bayside, N.Y.
Sir:
It appears to me that the Protestant churches are influencing or trying to influence national politics as much as they claim the Catholics will if put into high offices. Therefore, I conclude, the only way to prevent the presidency from being influenced by religion, either Catholic or Protestant, is to elect an objective, free-minded atheist.
ROLAND WEIS Seattle
Light on the Issue
Sir:
Regarding your Sept. 19 story on the religion issue in the Southern press, you said the Knoxville News-Sentinel had banned publication of letters to the editor that "shed a minimum amount of light on the [religion] issue and a maximum amount of bad feeling." The News-Sentinel did net take this stand. It was the Knoxville Journal which banned letters on religion. The News-Sentinel bans them other times but thinks they're pertinent in this campaign and uses them, eliminating, of course, crackpot, false, unreasonable and rash assertions.
LOYE W. MILLER Editor
Knoxville News-Sentinel Knoxville, Tenn.
Schools of Tomorrow
Sir:
My thanks, as a lifelong educator, to TIME for "Schools of Tomorrow." My own first school (beginning 1873) was a little, wooden, one-room schoolhouse--capacity about 40--with one teacher for all grades. Inspite of all architectural advances, gratefully noted, it must be remembered that the really good school demands a good teacher--the good teacher belongs to a noble profession.
ROCKWELL D. HUNT Calistoga, Calif.
Sir:
Because one builds an "eye-catching" school this doesn't completely satisfy the prerequisites of a sound education. As long as finance committees and American towns prefer to squander their money on architects and contractors, they can expect teachers to remain underpaid, books to be second rate, and their children to continue to get the mediocre education that Hutchins, Adler and Rickover have been lamenting for years.
ROBERT W. LOUTH Newton, Mass.
Sir:
I wonder whether some of your readers may not get the wrong impression from this article. You make no mention of the hundreds of thousands of American children still having to attend classes in basements, in barns and in firetrap structures because of the extreme shortage of schools.
GEORGE J. HECHT Publisher
Parents' Magazine New York City
P: For considerably more than a mere "mention of the hundreds of thousands of American children having to attend classes in basements, etc." see TIME Cover Story on Educator James Bryant Conant, Sept. 14, 1959--ED.
Sir:
We Baldwinites were proud to see the photo of the commons of our senior high school in your issue of Sept. 12. We are even more proud that the beautiful mural in the background of the commons was a gift to the school by the artist, George Kanelous.
HENRY C. DUCKER Superintendent
Baldwin Public Schools Baldwin, N.Y.
Sir:
Re "Schools of Tomorrow," Sept. 12. We are honored to be mistaken for Richard J. Neutra. I am sure he would have done Crow Island School better, but I believe that it was, in fact, designed by Perkins, Wheeler and Will, with Eliel and Eero Saarinen. Please advise before you put our babies out for adoption.
LAWRENCE B. PERKINS Perkins and Will Architects Chicago
P: TIME herewith sheepishly returns the Saarinens' and Reader Perkins' baby to its rightful parents.--ED.
Reading the Statues
Sir:
In the Sept. 5 issue you suggest an enigma in regard to the fair lady on the Washington Capitol dome. She is "Fertility" and was so designated by Sculptor Crawford 97 years ago.
I, as an oldtime physician, estimate that she is 7 1/2 months pregnant. She She wears the voluminous maternity dress of that day, but pregnant ladies then rarely so displayed themselves. She also carries, appropriately, a sheaf of wheat and I had thought also a shuttle of wool.
In 1950 she appeared as a lone figure on the three-cent national capitol sesquicentennial commemorative stamp, and I then urged my obstetrical friends to use this stamp quite appropriately for their reports and statements.
WARDNER D. AYER, M.D. Syracuse
Finder's Keepers
Sir:
While I am grateful for Mrs. Lyndon Johnson's observation about my lost-and-found talents ("He can find anything from lost luggage to a masseur"), I find that having a statement such as this appear in TIME is not without its problems. There have been so many requests coming in by mail and telephone to locate this, that and the other that I am beginning to feel like a junior-grade private eye. The only thing I really found on this trip was three very talented campaigners. If the menfolk would sit by and let these ladies take over, I am certain that the John Kennedy-Lyndon Johnson ticket would enjoy an even greater margin of victory.
WARREN WOODWARD Vice President KTBC Radio & Television Austin, Texas
Salaam
Sir:
A salaam--a very deep one--in tribute to Artist Bernard Safran for the absolute tops in portraiture--Shah of Iran.
TONIA MECHAM Omaha
Faster & Faster
Sir:
Associate Professor Leland D. Peterson has solved the problem of reading 42,316 words per minute, but how in the world has he figured out how to turn the pages fast enough?
ROBERT B. POSEY Lititz, Pa.
Sir:
Using Mr. Peterson's "spindrive cum corkscrew motion," I have managed to double his rate to 84,632 w.p.m. (not including the page numbers) by merely holding the pages to light and reading both sides of a page at the same time.
P. L. KROHN Easton, Pa.
Population Loss
Sir:
As an avid reader of your most excellent magazine, I am fascinated by the variety of information you are able to produce.
Can you tell me what was the total red Indian population when Europeans first settled in America, and the present total?
C. R. TOFTE Kitale, Kenya
P: The American Indian population, when the white man first arrived, is estimated to have been from 800,000 to 1,000,000. Today it is 475,000.--ED.
When the Twain Meet
Sir:
I cannot agree with your formula for the successful mating of East and West. I am German, and I am married to a Pakistani. Before coming to the U.S., I lived in Pakistan. I lived there very happily with my husband and with everybody else even though I 1) did not adopt Islam; 2) did not accept the constraints of Moslem society, e.g., I certainly did talk to my husband's male friends; 3) did not learn to wear a sari or salwar and kameez--for the same reason that your article points out: a Western girl rarely looks good in them.
(MRS.) ANNELIESE MOGHUL Tupper Lake, N.Y.
Sir:
It is her appalling lack of local language and customs that makes a Western wife an outsider in the society. What chances would you give to a Pakistani bride of enjoying herself in an American home if her attitude toward the American language and customs is as shoddy as that of an average Western wife in this country?
AFTAB AHMAD Karachi, Pakistan
Sir:
I am in complete agreement with the Indo-Pakistani press on the topic. Our students trained abroad can get brides of much better caliber and higher polish back home.
FARID KHAN Winnipeg, Canada
* The narrator in Melville's Moby Dick.
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