Cauthen on Top

To the Editors:

Steve Cauthen [May 29] has the enduring qualities of a new national hero. He has shown us that the seemingly rare combination of youth, hard and honest work, love and true talent is alive, well and at the top.

Leslie E. McBain San Leandro, Calif.

At 18 years, Steve Cauthen has put more energy and devotion into his career than most will in their lifetime. A born winner? Steve will be the first to tell you that there's just no such thing.

Alice C. Petersen Seattle

Congratulations to Steve Cauthen for achieving the ultimate at age 18, but I think a little credit is due to the horse.

Cheryl T. Smith

Rockford, III.

With so few young heroes let alone old ones today, you had to obliterate the image by sticking that cigar in his mouth. Whoever was responsible for that one should be kicked by Affirmed.

Shirley J. Crenshaw

Sheridan, Ore.

Zaire Invasion

The wanton and brutal murder of unarmed white civilian women and children in Zaire [May 29] should give all the liberal do-gooders, who are blindly supporting the black terrorists and advocating black majority rule for South Africa and Rhodesia, cause for concern.

Ed Crawford

Gaithersburg, Md.

Despite our post-Viet Nam aversion to direct military involvement of any sort, the Zaire invasion by Marxist rebels seems another oblique push from Mother Russia, and one which will necessitate action if similar activities continue to occur. The question is when will Jimmy Carter draw the line on this conspicuous, albeit indirect, Soviet expansionism?

John W. Langstaff

Tampa, Fla.

Plane Vote

I salute Senator Abraham Ribicoff for his courageous stand in voting for the warplane package [May 29] against a pressure-packed Jewish lobby.

Senators Javits and Church certainly showed their true colors. Little wonder the polls reflect a great distrust of politicians; our Senate deserves better.

Frank J. Toney

Tampa, Fla.

Speaking from the standpoint of a Jew, I can only say after reading about Abe Ribicoff's fight for Carter's Middle East plane package: With Jews like him, who needs anti-Semites?

Elizabeth Rogers

San Carlos, Calif.

The'60s

Writer Donald Morrison must have been on Mars during the '60s to describe that period as "a simpler age of love, peace and tolerance" [May 22].

Anyone who observed the total hostility and hatred of many of the antiwar element directed against those who disagreed with their views, or remembers the violence and destruction in the name of peace knows the '60s were not an age of "peace, love or tolerance."

Phil Jenkins

Orange Park, Fla.

Although I am too young to remember 1968, I envy the many who were part of, as you put it, "the strange cats in flowers, beads and headbands." Just as any grandmother or grandfather will tell you that their best days were spent during the Depression, anyone who was 18 and living it up in 1968 will tell you they spent their better days at this time.

B.C. Robbins

Ballston Spa, N. Y.

Bisexual Yankee?

The Connecticut legislature has tried hard to be nonsexist when it changed the word girls to folks in its new state song, Yankee Doodle [May 29]. The lyric "and with the girls be handy" has always conjured up the picture of Yankee Doodle as something of a ladies' man. What is he now, bisexual? I didn't think Connecticut was that liberal.

Dennis Frazier

Evansville, Ind.

In response to "The Trivial State of the States," I am somewhat heartened by Frank Trippett's observation that our legislatures are doing so little. It is pure folly to believe that more legislation is needed to protect our freedoms. New laws will only destroy the few frail freedoms that we have left.

Perhaps men are, at last, prepared for that government that governs not at all.

Phill Bauman

New York City

The fact that TIME never bothers to cover any of the creative and innovative efforts of state legislatures does not mean that they do not exist.

In Vermont, at least, we have spent far more time on these than on resolutions and state insect debates. We have not been willing to wait for Congress to solve all our problems, and have taken major steps on our own in land-use planning, environmental protection and meeting social needs.

Will Hunter, State Representative

Vermont House of Representatives

Montpelier, Vt.

The Face on the Coin

The most logical face for the coin dollar [May 29] is the wife of the man on the paper dollar. Let's give some credit to Martha, the very First Lady.

After all, she was the woman behind a great man.

Karol Fredricks

San Bruno, Calif.

A picture of Miss Liberty on the coin sounds like expensive nonsense. Let it be somebody sensible. And instead of IN GOD WE TRUST, engrave WOMEN CAN CHANGE

THE WORLD.

Margaret W. Tuttle

Martha's Vineyard, Mass.

Considering how the spendthrift bureaucrats and politicians have prostituted it, there is no one more suitable than the queen madam, Polly Adler, for the proposed metallic dollar.

Glover Hendrickson

Newbury Park, Calif.

Quotas

In the interest of Mr. Bakke [May 29] and those like him, I am perplexed by exactly what constitutes a minority or underprivileged person.

If Mr. Bakke is defeated and this ridiculous trend continues, I plan to apply to graduate school this fall as an Irish American woman, emotionally, culturally, and financially deprived by ancestors who lived through the potato famine --that will give me the best chance to make it in the top ten.

Marye Beth Dugan

Hartland, Wis.

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