Nation: Man Bites HEW

The Department of Health, Education and Welfare has been called the Department of Wealth, Aggravation and Hellfire. Last week former HEW Secretary John Gardner and the present Secretary, Robert Finch, compared aggravations during a ceremony to unveil a portrait of Gardner in the department auditorium.

“The way we’re going,” said Finch, ruefully quoting an aide, “there are not going to be too many more people we can offend.” He ticked off a list of the recently alienated: farmers (by the ban on DDT), the overweight (by the ban on cyclamates) and sportsmen (by the impounding of Lake Michigan coho salmon last spring). “The first problem we have,” said Finch, “is 40,000 inflammable Santa Clauses. I guess HEW will be known as the department that killed Santa Claus.”

Gardner replied by conjuring up a mythical group called AFSHEW (Association of Former Secretaries of HEW). One member, said Gardner, contracted rabies, and immediately called for paper and pen. When his doctor remonstrated that no will was necessary, as the disease would not be fatal, the man replied: “It’s not my will. It’s a list of people I’m going to bite.” Gardner parted by advising his successor: “Love your enemies. It makes them so damned mad.”