Court of Last Appeal

Sir: To describe Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas as "something of a folk hero to the young" [April 27] is to understate the issue. Justice Douglas is the major spokesman within the Establishment in America for individual freedom, and it now seems ludicrous that the political bullyboys should be planning a political show trial aimed at him. If he is removed from his seat on the High Court, millions of young people will know that the militant Weathermen are right, that America is totally gone as a free country, and that it may as well be put to rest quickly.

LOWELL PONTE Los Angeles

Sir: You make the seriously misleading statement that "a number of conservatives have been talking about impeaching William O. Douglas for ideas that many regard as radical."

Investigation of William O. Douglas that may lead to his impeachment is not for his "ideas" at all but solely with respect to his actions, sometimes individually and sometimes with others.

Specifically to be looked into are his publishing for pay of written statements in books and magazines encouraging unrest, violence and even revolution. Also, activities that may or may not consist of practicing law or receiving compensation for activities contrary to standards applicable to the judiciary by statute and rules of the Bar. His ideas and his personal life are his own business--but the House of Representatives cannot fail to investigate to determine whether or not the facts warrant impeachment in these circumstances. Louis C. WYMAN, Representative First District, New Hampshire Washington, D.C.

Sir: The judicial opinions of Mr. Justice Douglas have consistently and implicitly reaffirmed the sacredness of personal liberty. His compassionate regard for individual rights in an age of creeping Orwellian conformity is reassuring to those of us who are apprehensive of the Administration's plans to "bring us together." That Mr. Douglas prefers not to pattern his private life after the neo-Victorian vogue prevailing in Washington is understandable. That Mr. Douglas abhors crass censorship in the puritan tradition of Increase Mather is not only praiseworthy but also healthy.

ROBERT K. HENDRICKS Hillsboro, Ore.

Sir: Re Justice Douglas' use of George III as a "symbol of revolution": What he and most advocates or practitioners of violence seem to forget is the use of that great weapon against injustice or obsolete laws: the vote. It was unknown to the revolutionaries who suffered under taxation without representation.

We wonder how many rioting, usually youthful, destroyers of property and disturbers of the peace, who are 21 years old (soon 18) and over, use this powerful and responsible weapon?

(MRS.) B.B. WALKER Boston

Sir: Justice Douglas' Points of Rebellion is comparable to the writings of Burke, Hume and Locke--Englishmen who brought attention to the need for reform. Britain ignored the pleas and warnings, and the American Revolution resulted. I teach history and sometimes think it is a waste of time. Instead of learning from past mistakes, we repeat them.

RUS PURIFOY

El Paso

Seeing Them in Church

Sir: You say, "Sure enough, Apollo 13 . . . yielded little for the $380 million spent on it" [April 27]. Why is the expense of the space program always referred to as a waste of money? This program through the years has given employment--directly and indirectly--to thousands of Americans. Its byproducts are immeasurable in the technological advances made by industry.

Not only has the space program done much for science, it has also boosted our economy, our technology and our sagging patriotic spirits. And with the recovery of Apollo 13--who knows--even church attendance may go up.

MRS. JOSEPH L. DE GROOT Plainfield, Ill.

Sir: Your overdone account of the astronauts' brush with death is completely unrealistic. We lose brave men in the service every day, specifically due to "equipment failure" of one type or another. Yet their deaths are hardly noticed, except by their families. What's so different about an equipment failure in space? What is so important about this experimental gimmickry?

R.M. NEWBY Bethesda, Md.

Sir: Nobody's mentioned it yet, but it seems to me that the possibilities of sabotage or attack by an alien spaceship are not remote.

If this sounds like fantasy, so did a trip to the moon not ten years ago.

ONEK RAMUKJAR Dartmouth, N.S.

Crusaders or Kidnapers?

Sir: Now let me get this straight--in order to be pro-survival-of-the-world, at least according to many Earth Day orators [May 4], you must be against President Nixon, antiEstablishment, for an immediate pullout from Viet Nam and against the space program. Well, I believe in a just victory in Viet Nam, I approve of the President, I am part of the Establishment, and I see the sole survival of mankind as entirely dependent on colonizing new worlds via the space program. But I also deeply believe in ecology and conservation.

So, since the Joe McCarthys of the Old and New Left have kidnaped this crusade, with their required list of rigid opinions you must hold on all subjects, where does this leave me?

WILLIAM B. KNOWLTON Captain, U.S.A.F. Manhattan

Hung-Up for Relief

Sir: Talk about selling an image. Since the Mitchells have taken unto themselves a p.r. lady for Martha [April 20], I have seen a glamorous picture of her, read that her mail is on a 300 to 1 ratio in her favor, and learned from one of the Washington columnists that men at Washington soirees break their necks getting to her--so charming is she. Wow!

It won't wash, John. She still talks too much, out of turn, and is a menace to the current Administration--unless they are really hung-up for comic relief.

S. WEISS Elkins Park, Pa.

Children in Trouble

Sir: You treated pretty lightly a valuable suggestion by Dr. Arnold Hutschnecker for preventing juvenile delinquency [April 20]. "Emotional neglect" of children by parents, aggravated by unperceptive teachers, poses the greatest problem that juvenile judges face in their attempts to-help children in trouble. These emotionally disturbed children make up the group from which our juvenile delinquents and adult criminals come.

Dr. Hutschnecker's suggestion has a lot more merit than you ascribed to it. It wouldn't label these children predelinquent; it would only advise us that these are children in trouble, for these children are as likely to develop neuroses or psychoses as they are to exhibit criminal tendencies. The idea is not new.

Awareness of the emotional problems of the children in our court and attempts to help them have certainly shown results. In nearly six years only one of our former wards has gone to prison out of at least 700 children. To recognize and treat these rejected, hostile children is our only real hope of reducing our skyrocketing crime rate.

DONALD M. HABERMEHL Judge of Probate Alpena County Alpena, Mich.

Not to Praise Him

Sir: Two of the acts for which you accord praise to Prime Minister Trudeau in "The Sober Swinger" [April 27] are open to diametrically opposite interpretations.

His "modernizing the mechanisms of government" has resulted in limiting debate on any bill in the Commons to a maximum of ten days, thus giving himself and his liberal majority virtual dictatorial power in the passing and rejection of proposed legislation. This is a rather odd way of achieving the "participatory democracy" he promised at election time. The plan of "paying farmers to slash their wheat production by some 90% this year" is something less than rational and humane for the leader of a country where thousands of Metis, Indians, Eskimos and urban and rural poor are suffering and dying from malnutrition.

JEFF BARNARD Scarborough, Ont.

Omen for Optimists

Sir: While Vienna's Belvedere Palace may have an ominous significance for pessimistic observers of the SALT talks [April 20], the optimists need not despair of a positive omen for fruitful negotiations. It was at Belvedere in 1955 that the Soviet Union made one of the most important concessions of the post-World War II period by agreeing with the U.S., Britain and France to the reunification of Austria as a sovereign neutral nation.

SID DISHER JR. St. Petersburg, Fla.

Protesting the Percentage

Sir: You wonder why antiwar protesters "pick on" G.M., since "last year it received only 3% of its $24.45 billion revenues from defense contracts . . ." [April 27]. If G.M.'s revenues were to triple, we would only be talking about 1%; if they declined to $2.445 billion, defense contracts would be yielding 30% of the total. Playing games with percentages may obscure but does not obliterate the fact that for helping prosecute a questionable, counterproductive war, G.M. took in $733.5 million. That may be small change in G.M.'s back pocket, but it sure can spread a lot of unnecessary death around. It is this latter point that the protesters, but apparently not TIME, have noted.

ROBERT F. CLARK Atlanta

Charnley's Greenhouse

Sir: May 1, in fairness, point out a number of omissions in your otherwise excellent review of the Charnley total hip replacement [April 27]. Charnley himself must be credited with developing the sterile-air chamber for surgery more than ten years ago at Wrightington, not just the suction mask as your article intimated. Dr. Bechtol's excellent design is based on Charnley's original "greenhouse."

Since July 1966, when I had the privilege of introducing Charnley's operation in this country, many centers have adopted it, including Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in New York, Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, the University of Illinois Hospitals in Chicago, the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, and Massachusetts General and New England Baptist hospitals in Boston. It would be less than fair to omit mention of these major teaching institutions that remain in the van of orthopedic practice in this country.

MARK G. LAZANSKY, M.D. Attending Orthopedic Surgeon Hospital for Joint Diseases Manhattan

Late Date

Sir: I thank you for your marvelous article [April 27], and let's make a date for ten years from now to see which Tchaikovsky is on television. Incidentally you forgot the one in giving cost of film; it was closer to $12 million than $2,000,000. DIMITRI TIOMKIN

London

Dedication to Transformation

Sir: The reviewer of Professor X's (Daniel Boorstin) The Sociology of the Absurd [April 13] missed what is probably the most delightful point of satire against society found in the book: the dedication "To Dick and Gloria Dorspn--Motif No. D132." Professor Dorson is director of the Folklore Institute at Indiana University, and D132 refers to a unit of classification--the motif--used by folklorists in breaking down tales into component parts for analysis. Motif No. D132 is "transformation man to ass."

JOHN MESSENGER Professor Folklore Institute Indiana University Bloomington, Ind.

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