Dinner Check

The letter from a Washington oil lobbyist named Jack Evans got right down to the business of dunning for money:

Secretary Udall, who happens to be a friend of long standing, has asked me as a personal favor to him to solicit the Oil and Gas Industry in Washington in an effort to help the Secretary dispose of his "very sizable quota of tickets for the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner." Tickets are $100 per plate. Send your check to me.

Printed at the top of the letter dated April 5 were the names of 56 oil and gas company officials--clear warning to each that his competition was being solicited to pony up for the New Frontier. Even more meaningful was the notation in the lower left-hand corner: "cc: The Honorable Stewart Udall." As he said later, Interior Secretary Udall was "appalled" and "flabbergasted" when he learned that his name was being used to blackjack political funds from the oil and gas industry, over which the Interior Department holds life-and-death powers. Udall tried, unsuccessfully, to get the letters recalled. But beyond that, he remained silent, and it remained for Washington Columnist Peter Edson to break the story last week.

Back in hot water with Republicans howling for his head, controversial Stew Udall called in the press, after first carefully stationing at his side venerable Poet Robert Frost, his luncheon guest, as a sort of mute character witness. Udall angrily denied that he had meant to bludgeon money from the oil and gasmen. He admitted that he was a good friend of Evans', an official of Asiatic Petroleum Co., an affiliate of the Royal Dutch Shell group. But, said Udall, all that he had done was to tell Evans casually that he hoped to see him and "a few of his friends" at the Democratic dinner.

At his press conference, Udall claimed that Evans' company had been "clobbered" by an Interior decision that he had made on oil (a reallocation of import quotas). Cried Udall: "I can take care of the Republicans, but protect me from my friends." After hiding out a day, Lobbyist Evans emerged to declare mildly that he had written the letter "as a private citizen of our democracy with no thought of gaining any personal favors."

The affair came just one week after the publication of President Kennedy's high-principled code of ethics for Government officials.

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