Hot Choice

For the 33,000 inhabitants of the U.S. Virgin Islands, the burning post-election issue was: Who would be President Kennedy's choice for their new Governor? Last week they got their answer when the President appointed Ralph Paiewonsky, millionaire rum merchant. Although the announcement slaked everybody's curiosity, the political atmosphere surrounding it was as hot as the noon sun over Charlotte Amalie.

Smooth, quiet Ralph Paiewonsky, 53, is a scion of the islands' wealthiest family, whose empire has come to embrace shops, movies, insurance, banking and, more recently, a distillery in St. Croix that accounts for half the islands' total rum output. Besides bossing the distillery effectively and steadily expanding family real estate holdings, Paiewonsky has made himself top banana in local Democratic politics, for two solid decades has been Democratic National Committeeman from the islands.

To many islanders, Paiewonsky's nomination was welcome news. Flower-bedecked cars paraded through St. Croix and outgoing Governor John David Merwin, a Republican, predicted that Paiewonsky will make "an excellent Governor." But the reaction was far from unanimous. Even before the nomination, Washington officials began to get a stream of letters from the islands charging Paiewonsky with a variety of sins including plans to convert St. Thomas into a wide-open Las Vegas of the Caribbean. From the Interior Department word leaked that Secretary Stewart Udall, under whom Paiewonsky would work, was dismayed at the choice.

The most frequent charge leveled against Paiewonsky was conflict of interest. As Governor, he would sit on the board of the government's Virgin Islands Corp., which sets the price of molasses sold to the Paiewonsky distillery. Conceding the seriousness of the question, Paiewonsky has promised to divest himself of holdings that do business with the government. His closely knit family, however, with their interlocking businesses, will still have a heavy interest in the islands. Whether all this will satisfy the Senate when Paiewonsky comes up for confirmation remains to be seen.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.