Crisis & the U.N.
Sir:
We were treated to an excellent example of how a few screaming idiots can throw a group of people into a panic. This was the TV coverage of the United Nations spectator demonstration by a group of Lumumba supporters. This is the Communistic psychology in action. This is how to convert a crowd of thousands into a raging mob of head-bashing, flag-burning, window-breaking "supporters" of a cause. This is our price of tolerance. When will we realize that those who are out to destroy us, or who support those who are out to destroy us, should not be tolerated?
GEORGE F. JOHNSON
Upper Darby, Pa.
Sir:
Many U.S. citizens think of the U.N. as a club or civic organization for those nations that believe in liberty, justice and a better life. Aren't these principles incorporated in the U.N. charter? Now we learn that Egypt, Ghana and Guinea have deserted the U.N. effort to stabilize the Congo, and that Russia refuses to help pay the U.N. Congo bill. We don't understand. If these countries won't support the club, why are they kept in? We suggest a tough resolution by our country, as aggressive and demanding as the Soviets have been, asking the ouster (or at least suspension) from the United Nations of Egypt, Ghana, Guinea and Russia.
KENNETH KINGERY
Stoughton, Wis.
Sir:
At least Patrice Lumumba died like a man, face to face with his enemies. This is more than can be said for Kasavubu and Tshombe, too cowardly to meet their political doom in front of the democratically elected Parliament of their country.
ACHIKE ENUWA
Shagamu, Nigeria
The U.N. & Red China
Sir:
Now that Mr. Kennedy is President, Lord Home announces that Britain will vote against the U.S. on the question of Red China's admission to the U.N. Is this our first example of the "strong" Kennedy leadership v. the "weak" Eisenhower leadership?
DAVID LINDSAY
New Haven, Conn.
Sir:
Cheers for Britain's Foreign Minister, Lord Home! Even an average housewife, with an average husband, average children, and living in an average neighborhood, cannot help but recognize that one cannot banish evil by refusing to know it's there. Keeping Red China out of the U.N. only tends to increase their resentment and stall any progress toward disarmament.
DOROTHY A. NILSEN
Carlsbad, Calif.
No Prufrock He?
Sir:
Doubtless, scores of T. S. Eliot devotees, not to mention old T.S. himself, have taken offense at the unenviable status accorded him by your inapplicable excerpt from The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. "I grow old . . . I grow old . . ." implies that our hero, like Prufrock, has aged into aimless ineffectivity, a frustrated prisoner of existence. All such inferences are belied by your magazine, which shows Eliot, scantily clad, in unmistakably blissful contentment, visibly impervious to his public, and matrimonially endowed with a woman less than half his age.
FORBES LASALLE III
Lakeville, Conn.
Pictures in the Civil War
Sir:
Re the article "Artist-Journalists of the Civil War," I am surprised you made no mention of one of America's better-known artists, who as a young man served as an artist-reporter for Harper's Weekly. His name? Winslow Homer.
RUTH M. LAMB
Syracuse, N.Y.
I Homer was indeed one of the Special Artists of the Civil War (with Harper's Weekly] ; for a sample of his work, see cut. However, he did only a few on-the-scene drawings. They were better as art than as reporting. -ED.
Long, Long Division
Sir:
I hope teachers in English schools do not use TIME'S method of dividing money. The simple approach is:
-L-1 2s. 3d. 23|-L-25 11s. 9d. 23/2=40s
51s. 46 5=60d
69d 69
By the way, how does TIME divide 25 hr. 48 min. 40 sec. by 23 ?
WARREN HIMMELBERGER
Wellesley Hills, Mass.
Ecumaniacs?
Sir:
We much appreciated the clarion call of sanity by [Methodist] Bishop Kennedy.
In order to have a union of Christians as Pike and Blake would advocate, we would need vast machinery and "spiritual or religious bureaucrats" to make it run. Competition in any field is better than uniformity without it. Jesus was extremely interested in the individual and in his spiritual integrity. People need to cooperate in doing the works of Christ, but they need to do it in their own ways, with their own government of the church, with each one having a vital part in it. We have had enough of "ecclesiastical bureaucrats" and of the hierarchy.
(THE REV.) RICHARD PARKER YAPLE
First Christian Church
Cimarron, Kans.
Sir:
Bishop Kennedy says, "It all sounds so spiritual and satisfying until a skeptic begins to think of all the administration involved." Perhaps Kennedy and others would like to study the scriptural system in use by Churches of Christ (not United). Each congregation is self-governing, under its own group of bishops (elders), just as in New Testament times. It should be the constant prayer of all Christians that the unity of Christ's church be upheld: "One Lord, one faith, one baptism . . ."* Our present pluralism is not only weakness but unscriptural.
(THE REV.) DUANE W. RAMSEY
Church of Christ
San Angelo, Texas
What's In a Name
Sir:
The review of Graham Greene's new book A Burnt-Out Case, drew a chuckle from the remark "and only Graham Greene could think of this," in reference to a "boy" named Deo Gratias. I don't know who thought of it, but this is in fact quite a common name in East Africa as well as in the Congo.
Here is a picture of one Deo Gratias-the handsome man in the overcoat-taken at Kilembe in Toro, Uganda. We know of another gentleman in Tanganyika who is even more distinguished by his name--Deo Gratias Pepsi-Cola.
GREGORY O'CONOR
Bethesda, Md.
Sir: You published a review of Graham Greene's latest novel, A Burnt-Out Case, under the unsavory title, "Love Among the Lepers." As the person to whom the book is dedicated, I cannot but express my deep concern at your warped and lurid analysis of the novel. Since you agree that the theme of the novel does not center on the disease, you have deliberately and, in my estimation, shamefully exploited medieval attitudes to ward leprosy which render needless sensationalism. Graham Greene, as a novelist, has a right to choose whatever background he finds suitable to his writings, in this case an African leprosarium. The author's attitude toward the leprosy patient is respectful, in contrast to the thoughtless attitude of your reviewer.
Leprosy is a curable disease with a very low degree of contagiousness. One of the greatest problems encountered by leprologists in treating the 15 million patients existing in the world is an irrational fear toward this disease. Such reviews as yours cause undesirable reactions highly detrimental to a balanced approach to the leprosy problem. MICHEL F. LECHAT, M.D.
Washington, D.C.
Schools & Taxes
Sir:
Americans do not seem to realize the full importance of denial of federal aid to parochial schools, whether they are Catholic, Protestant, Jewish or any other religious schools.
In the first place, all churches in America are free from taxation, so none of them would be contributing to this federal aid they are trying to get. In the second place, parochial schools are not under the jurisdiction of any public school board. In the third place, federal aid would mean that all religious groups would be supporting each other despite the fact that they disagree with nearly everything taught in any church but their own.
This, sir, is taxation without representation, and we fought that battle back in 1776.
MRS. C. A. DORE
Glendora, NJ.
Sir:
The public schools are here for everybody. People who do not want them should pay for what they do want and stop whining.
ELIZABETH LLOYD
New York City
Knackwurst
Sir:
Re your haw-haw-lier-than-thou reviewer's damning with faint puns Peter De Vries' Through the. Fields of Clover: for such a pun-stirrer to grind up De Vries' meaty message with half-witticisms of his own seems in wurst possible taste--particularly in such a notorious quip-joint as TIME.
GERALD A. KOETTING
Normandy, Mo.
Sir:
As fur as we're concerned, your puplication deserves the Poochlitzer Prize for your movie review of 101 Dalmatians.
JORDAN BERLINER
TOMLIN STEVENS
Chicago
*Ephesians 4:5.
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