Letters, Apr. 29, 1940

Coincidence?

Sirs:

On p. 63 of the April 8 issue is an article about Oscar Fabres, the French cartoonist, showing a comic strip which is a swipe from my own strip which appeared in Judge about 15 years ago.

There are plenty of honest American cartoonists who could use the space given to this pilfering Frenchman.

Enclosed is a photostatic copy of my original.

CARL T. ANDERSON

Creator of “Henry” Madison, Wis.

Flunked Sirs:

I am a student at the Glendale Junior College in Glendale, Calif. Recently our English teacher instructed us to make a report on a book review given in one of the better known magazines.

I chose the review of Sinclair Lewis’ latest book, Bethel Merriday, from the March 25 TIME. When we came to class the next day with our assignments we told the name of the book selected, the reviewer, and the magazine from which it was taken.

When she found that I had used TIME she refused to accept the report, thus making mine a failure. Several others in the class received the same treatment. She said, “TIME is not a literary magazine, and therefore your report is not satisfactory.”

I think your reviewers are competent. What is your opinion? I would appreciate your help in proving to Miss Murphy that the TIME reviewers are able.

RODERICK MCCHESNEY

Glendale, Calif.

> TIME’S opinion is that English Teacher Murphy flunked.—ED.

Russell Case

Sirs:

It is hard to decide whether grim comedy or tragedy is the prevailing note in the Bertrand Russell ouster [TIME, April 8]. There is plenty of both. The comedy is in the fact that his ouster will make not the slightest difference in sex morals statistics of the school from which he was fired, or of any school in the country. I’ve a notion that most college deans would agree with me that the average youngster goes to college with his moral pattern pretty well decided. . . .

In other words, bouncing Russell didn’t save American womanhood. It saves itself, or doesn’t get saved, according to individual preference.

The tragedy, as I see it, is that this operation was not an intelligent inquiry into the fitness of a teacher (something which is always in order) but a Bible-belt and anti-foreigner witch hunt. The forces which hate the foreigner, hate the English, etc., etc., were loosed. I disagree with Russell’s contention that morals are entirely your own business, because nothing can be entirely your own business if you are a part of any social group. But I do think he would have been harmless as a mathematics professor. Those higher mathematicians I’ve seen do not look as though they could be damaged by any amount of incorrect moral teaching. . . .

GEORGE APPEL

Detroit, Mich.

Sirs:

I have just read your report on the Russell controversy in TIME’S April 8 issue, and it is, for me, “the last straw which broke the camel’s back.” I am a Catholic and the mother of three young children, who would rather scrub floors to send her children to a private college than be forced to send them to a public college where they would be compelled to listen to Professor Russell’s theories on “Marriage and Morals.” Every day of my life I must pay taxes, part of which go to maintain a college to which I have every right to expect my children may go, if they are “college material.” I have every right, too, to expect that they will not be taught there to disrespect and throw aside a code of life which the majority of citizens desire to adhere to. Yet, because one mother was articulate enough to present the case of millions of us you turn on your “derisive technique” in an attempt to belittle her and the more prominent of her supporters—Bishop Manning is “brittle” and “little” (evidently making his opinions likewise); on the other hand Justice McGeehan is “big” and “burly” (obviously not the proper physique either for straight thinking); then, too, Justice McGeehan is a “good Catholic” and a “good organization Democrat”—a combination which has some (use your own judgment) effect on his interpretation of the law; Lawyer Goldstein is “roly-poly” (imagine those contours ever being right) and he presumes to act as a “critic” with regard to a man who advocates the privileges of marriage without the obligations for college students. But Professor Russell is referred to three times as “Earl Russell” and once as “67-year-old Bertrand Russell” (age being honorable and an antidote for immoral teaching).

Definitely, I’ve had enough, and I hereby donate the balance of my subscription to anyone you may decide has the proper figure, stature and physiognomy to appreciate it.

AGNES M. SHERIDAN

New York City.

> TIME sponsored neither Bertrand Russell nor his opponents, described him as looking like the Mad Hatter at Alice’s tea-party, considers its remarks about those who attacked him equally gentle.—ED.

Sirs:

… I am the father of a 16-year-old daughter. She is of the same impressionable age as is the daughter of Mrs. Jean Kay. The good Bishop and Judge McGeehan have made it clear that the influence of persons holding immoral views should be kept from the youth of this City.

At this moment the Board of Education is about to erect a beautiful edifice—a new high school, which is to be one of the finest in the United States. This building, which is to be paid for with the taxpayers’ money, is to be named in honor of a man . . . who entered into a “marriage” the legality of which was questioned at the time by the church and concerning which there has always been a grave doubt with respect to whether his “wife’s” former husband was then living. … In almost any of his biographies can be found, for instance, a letter called “Advice to a Young Man on the Choice of a Mistress.” This letter, which deals lucidly and lewdly with sex, is only a sample of many of his writings in the same vein.

In matters of religion he was frequently in difficulties with the church. He described himself as a man who believed not in the forms of religion, but in the Golden Rule, and he was a defender and friend of Thomas Paine.

It was not merely a question of the times, as this man’s morals were as much out of tune with the church and mores of his times as are Bertrand Russell’s today. . . .

True, Benjamin Franklin, like Bertrand Russell, was also a scientist, mathematician, philosopher and writer. But almost any biography which my daughter will be able to obtain of Benjamin Franklin would disclose to her his immoral sex life and views. Surely, … the Board of Education of a great city like New York should not be permitted to build a monument, with the taxpayers’ money, to such a man as Benjamin Franklin. . . .

AN ANXIOUS FATHER

(Name Omitted by Request) New York City

Mighty Happy

Sirs:

First I want to apologize for never having expressed to TIME my appreciation of their tribute to me in the recent advertisement which was so widely published.* It was the finest tribute I ever received and came as a surprise. . . .

I received between five and 600 letters from as far away as California congratulating me on the advertisement. There was not a single note of criticism and all were complimentary. Among the letters, some were from men that were my playmates in childhood that I haven’t seen in more than 50 years. I received one letter from a U.S. Senator, several judgesand six or eight members of congress. Ministers of all denominations, includingseveral Catholic priests, sent me their congratulatiosn.

Here in New Orleans my telephone was kept busy for days after the advertisement appeared. As late as yesterday a prominent businessman from Texas came in and said he wanted to shake the hand of the man TIME had so complimented. My college paper at Randolph-Macon, in Virginia, gave me an editorial due to TIME’S complimentary estimate on my part in the recent Louisiana campaign.

I received many letters congratulating me on the “bad boy who has made good.” One letter came from a little mountain town in Virginia which I left when I was ten years old and where my father was pastor. It was from a man now grown old who has been judge in his circuit for more than a quarter of a century. He asked if I remembered when we sat on the steps of the little country schoolhouse and sing for the little girls “Maid of Athens Ere We Part; Give, Oh Give Me Back My Heart.” Other letters recalled escapades of college days, poker games, football games and pranks.

This advertisement of TIME has made a man now growing old mighty happy. . . .

JAMES E. CROWN

Managing Editor

New Orleans States

New Orleans, La.

Nickname

Sirs:

So Racket-Buster Dewey last autumn became merely “Buster” Dewey in sarcastic appreciation of his age [TIME, April 15]!

To whom did Mr. Dewey become “Buster”? From my observation, only to TIME, which coined the contemptuous nickname, vainly strove to popularize it. I am glad to note a softening of TIME’S snooty attitude toward the District Attorney, even though only by grace of a Wisconsin landslide. But for the love of Mike, why not go all the way and abolish that “Buster” thing? Such infantile name-calling on the part of TIME’S editors suggests a mental age that invites sarcastic appreciation.

LEWIS BUSH

Lynbrook, L. I.

> TIME neither coined nor sneered at Candidate Dewey’s neat nickname, doubts that it will materially influence his chances, in any case.—ED.

29 Months

Sirs:

In reference to your recent article in TIME (April 15) describing the work of Dr. Myrtle B. McGraw at the Normal Child Development Study of Columbia University, an important correction should be made. It is true that Dr. McGraw’s marriage was on a contractual basis and that it took place four years ago. However, it is not true that this type of marriage was undertaken for purposes of speed and it is likewise not true that her daughter is now 3½ years of age. . . . Actually Dr. McGraw’s daughter is now 29 months of age.

A. A. WEECH, M. D.

Director of the Normal Child Development Study

Department of Pediatrics

Columbia University

New York, N. Y.

> To Dr. Myrtle B. McGraw and her husband, Engineer Rudolph F. Mallina, TIME’S earnest apologies for a typographical error which changed 2½ to 3½—ED.

*Describing how Editor Crown’s efforts uncovered proof of graft and undid the crooked heirs of Huey Long in Louisiana. years. I received one letter from a U. S. Senator, several judges and six or eight members of Congress. Ministers of all denominations, including several Catholic priests, sent me their congratulations.