Blisters from the March
Sir: Your frivolous treatment of the "Spring Mobilization to End the War in Viet Nam" [April 21] was in keeping with the foolishness of the event itself.
Nevertheless, however ridiculous the demonstrations appeared on the surface, they were anything but funny to several million American servicemen.
KENNETH F. STRICKLAND Captain, U.S.A.F. Arlington, Va.
Sir: From TIME'S article and photographs, one would think that the demonstrators were almost exclusively New Leftists, acidheads, pacifists, young, and not to be taken seriously.
TIME neglected to mention the veterans, many wearing campaign ribbons and decorations, who participated. TIME neglected to mention the many groups of professional people who marched; teachers and medical groups were well represented. My impression of the crowd was one of middle-class respectability. The turned-on, tuned-in, dropped-out set was a minority. Yes, Stokely Carmichael shot off his mouth, but he was more than counterbalanced by the reasoned arguments of the other speakers. Yes, there were some radicals and fanatics and Viet Cong flags. They were more than counterbalanced by the overwhelming majority of participants: everyday people who believe that patriotism demands more than unquestioning support of one's government, who remember that the standard defense at Niirnberg was "I only followed orders."
PETER VANADIA Manhattan
Sir: The march was not "fun." It was an exhausting six hours on foot; it rained; we were all cold and hungry.
You failed to capture the spirit of the marchers. The general attitude transcended that of the painted teenyboppers: celery, crackers and candy bars being passed through the crowd; patient waiting at every corner; ten strangers huddling together under one umbrella. The high spirits of the march did not stem from a lack of seriousness but from the good feeling of representing important ideals.
Maybe the march accomplished nothing concrete. Maybe its principles are too impractical for our Great Society. Love, brotherhood, peace: that's what the march was about. You should have been there. NORA K. LAFLEY ANN KIBLING Connecticut College New London
Measuring the Giant
Sir: As a naturalized American citizen and a New York resident for 20 years, I wish to congratulate you calorosamente for your benign, brassy, bothering, blatant, beautiful and very belated cover story [April 21] on my always beloved Brazil.
R. CHARLES EASTWOOD Manhattan
Sir: Some day, I keep hoping, you will grow out of this thing you have for dictators and stop your juvenile swooning over every two-bit muscle man who comes along promising to make the trains run on time by jailing every lefty and long-hair in sight. Now you're whitewashing your new Brazilian hero with the same holy water you have sprinkled so smugly over similar free-world saviors, such as Thailand's boss. This brings to mind your fairy tales about Diem ten years back. If we are to avoid getting ensnared in other tragedies like Viet Nam, magazines like yours had better start telling it like it is.
JAMES STANBERY San Pedro, Calif.
JOCKEY CLUB Sir: While general congratulations are due you for "Weighing In for '68" [April 14], I take issue with your minimization of Our Draft Kennedy movement.
There were 60 favorable replies to our letter to former convention delegates (not 28 as you reported), and three of these former delegates--including former Congressman Charles O. Porter--are members of our National Coordinating Committee. Even more impressive was the fact that we received only 65 negative responses. Other prominent Democrats have privately encouraged us, but for their own reasons have seen fit to withhold public support.
There are now 43 Citizens for Kennedy-Fulbright chapters in 22 states, including two in L.B.J.'s home state of Texas (Austin and San Antonio). We boast a membership of nearly 4,000 in 48 states plus the District of Columbia. This "draft movement" has only just begun. We expect to have an even larger impact in the future.
MARTIN SHEPARD, M.D. National Chairman Citizens for Kennedy-Fulbright Manhattan
Sir: An interesting assessment of the presidential hopefuls. I thought the description of Rockefeller especially apt. It would be a shame if a man of his proved ability and statesmanship were overlooked on the basis of an event in his personal life, the details of which the public is (rightfully) ignorant about.
THOMAS SHELDON Middlebury, Vt.
Sir: You mention Reagan as a presidential possibility. But the first 100 days of his administration show confusion, ineptness, destructive programs, and a disregard for the welfare of the people. He and his advisers, wealthy reactionaries, have placed the dollar above human rights, offered nothing creative or constructive. If good looks, a nice smile and a mouthful of beautiful teeth are the requisites for the presidency, he has all the qualifications.
W.JACOBS San Francisco
Sir: Holy Toledo! One of the best TIME covers I've seen. Conrad even makes good play on the brand name of the scales that we see in butcher shops and bus stations from Rocky's New York to Ronnie's California. Truly a picture worth a thousand votes. Let's have more of Conrad as the boys jockey for position on the way to the starting gate.
(Ppc.) RICHARD L. PALATUCCI Fort Knox, Ky.
Sir: Your cover is frightfully delightful. But why did Conrad exclude that political perennial? In other words, where the hell is Stassen? Surely that is not Childe Harolde in the background staring angrily over the right shoulder of Gorgeous George?
JIM LOWRY Dallas
Sir: Conrad has pictured Richard Nixon in checkered silks, supposedly symbolizing the dog Checkers. But, as any sports-minded person can see, Nixon's checkered silks represent the checkered flag used for winners.
HENRY KOPITZKE Riverside, Calif.
Go East . . .
Sir: While we would have to disagree with a number of individual pronouncements in "The Unpleasant Reality," your article on East Germany [April 7], we do applaud the initiative shown by TIME in exploring this neglected topic. We agree wholeheartedly with the "Letter from the Publisher" when it says that East Germany "is in many ways a crucial area in a new Europe of growing East-West contacts" and that "less is known about it" than about "any other of Eastern Europe's Communist countries."
For these reasons we are planning as a cooperative venture of the Great Lakes Colleges Association a summer institute for 1968 at Kenyon College devoted to the study of the German Democratic Republic and aimed at an objective assessment of what has been termed "the German problem."-Since we have found it simple to travel in East Germany, the institute program will entail a four-week study tour there.
(PROF.) EDMUND P. HECHT Kenyon College Gambier, Ohio
Unsaid
Sir: In your story on the Vanderbilt symposium [April 21] you state: "Heard says that unless he gets a 'substantial' vote of confidence, he will quit." To correct the record, I have not said this or anything similar publicly or privately.
ALEXANDER HEARD Chancellor Vanderbilt University Nashville, Tenn.
All Saints
Sir: "Prosperity and Protest" [April 14] is insufficiently researched.
The charge that Mormons are unconcerned with politics and community service is contradicted by the fact that the percentage of Mormons in Congress is at least twice the percentage of Mormons in the U.S., and by the fact that not only the 12,800 missionaries but all Latter-Day Saints try to perfect the community through the home. No other religious group in the country is taught so early in life to respect and support the Constitution.
Social pressures do not change Mormon doctrine. It was not a "new revelation" that led Mormons to abandon polygamy but laws passed by Congress and upheld by the court of last resort--and Mormons obey the law of the land.
W. REID GUSTAFSON Tokyo
Sir: Your fangs are showing. Compare the inconspicuous, comfortable garment of the Mormon with the medieval, bulky garb of the Catholic nun or priest--which is the "quaint tradition?"
Is the extent of Mormon holdings supposed to be greater or a more closely guarded secret than the extent of Catholic holdings?
Revelation is not subject to the whims of expediency: it is unlikely to be hurried to affect a political campaign. Members of the priesthood must love all people, and it is easy to see why the Lord would consider it unfair to require this of Negroes at this time. We can be sure the priesthood will be granted the Negro at the best time for his welfare, not when TIME deems it right. Any Mormon who calls it a "problem" that doctrine can be changed only by revelation is not a good Mormon--revelation is the heart of our church.
MARJORIE WHITTEMORE Daytona Beach, Fla.
Sir: As a former "Saint" from "Zion," I must enlighten you on another closely guarded secret of the Mormon Church: once a member always a member.
The membership figure of 2,600,000 includes several thousand "defectors" like myself and family who chose another religion and requested that our names be removed from the rolls. We were informed that to have our names removed from the church membership, we would have to appear before a "bishop's court" for heresy charges. Thus Mormon Church membership figures are as accurate as Billy Graham's pledge-card tally.
KENNETH N. TAYLOR Lake Hopatcong, N.J.
Fellowship of Seekers
Sir: I thought your article on the survey of Unitarians [April 14] was fair and accurate--as far as it went. The trouble is, too many people know what Unitarians don't believe in (the divinity of Christ, the virgin birth, etc.), and too few know what we do believe in.
For Unitarians, the emphasis is on deeds rather than creeds. We believe that morality has more to do with the human use of human beings than with ecclesiastical laws supposedly handed down on Mount Sinai. Unitarianism accommodates a range of viewpoints, from the mysticism of a Ralph Waldo Emerson to the profound humanism of an Adlai Stevenson, because Unitarians recognize the tentative nature of all human knowledge. We refuse to straitjacket ourselves with fixed creeds because we want to be open to new truth as it unfolds--and therein lies our faith: we're a fellowship of seekers rather than of people who presume to know.
R. EUGENE BULLOCK First Unitarian Society of West Newton Newtonville, Mass.
The Right to Fly
Sir: It is distressing that the Navy has suggested a moratorium on airline hiring of military pilots [April 14]. Consider the feelings of a Navy pilot who has returned to the U.S. after having flown 200 combat missions over North Viet Nam. He has completed his 5 1/2 year obligated service, and is now looking forward to entering the civilian community. Is he to find that if his choice of employment is with an airline, he is being discriminated against because of his former job? Has he risked his life to help preserve one basic freedom, that of self-determination, in another country only to discover that in so doing he has deprived himself of another basic freedom in his own country?
JOAN MILES White Plains, N.Y.
Crabs Over Lobsters
Sir: Your survey of services in the skies [April 14] opened my eyes to the absurdities of competition as conspicuous consumption. Does the passenger really exist who will, all essentials being equal, forsake Airline X's wide-screen movies for Airline Y's unpronounceable desserts? He would more likely, offered the choice, forsake miniskirts for mini-fares, secure in the knowledge that the stewardess is more adept at use of emergency equipment and exits than at a quick change for dinner. Scuttling the seven entrees might even give her the leisure to furnish the aspirin someone requested ten minutes ago.
Competing airlines won't win us with luxury but with actual service. They will win us when getting to the airport isn't half the trip, when they eliminate the ten-minute baggage check and the 20-minute walk to the gate, when they depart and arrive on schedule, when they no longer sacrifice safety for speed, size and splendor, when they subtract the gold tassels and lobster thermidor from the cost of our fare.
MARGARET L. BOWERS Milwaukee
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