National Affairs: New Faces

Still hewing the beams of his Administration structure. President Eisenhower last week announced an unusual number of appointments and nominations. Ex-Senator Harry Cain of Washington and former Governor Thomas J. Herbert of Ohio were nominated to the Subversive Activities Control Board. As Democratic member of the Civil Service Commission, replacing Frances Perkins, the President named Frederick J. Lawton. Harry Truman’s Budget Director. The departure of Madam Perkins, who was the nation’s first woman Cabinet officer, coincided almost precisely with the swearing of Oveta Gulp Hobby as the second. At Mrs. Hobby’s oath-taking as the first Secretary of Health. Education and Welfare, the President grinned, remarked: “Now your rank is no longer simulated. Now you are a real Secretary.”

Two Assistant Secretaries of the Army were nominated: James P. Mitchell, a Manhattan department-store executive (Macy’s, then Bloomingdale’s), and Czech-born John Slezak. who landed in the U.S. in 1916 with $5 in his pocket, rose to become president of Illinois’ Turner Brass Works. A Baltimore banker, Guy T. O. Hollyday, was named Federal Housing Commissioner. And as his personal economic adviser in Korea. Ike appointed young (40) Henry Tasca, a top expert on foreign economic problems. Tasca left immediately for Korea.

The President’s activities spilled over into the weekend. He skipped his weekly press conference, attended the Gridiron Club’s spring dinner, lunched with Governor Dewey (whose plane was 1½ hours late), conferred lengthily with his Advisory Committee on Government Organization (Nelson Rockefeller, Milton Eisenhower,

Arthur Flemming) on plans for further renovations of the Executive Department. To the 48 governors, the President sent invitations for a high-level, secret briefing in Washington early next month. On the agenda: international relations, national security, fiscal policies.

On Sunday, Ike went to the Pan American Union to deliver the third major address of his Administration, announced that he was sending his brother Milton, president of Pennsylvania State College, as a special envoy to Latin America (see THE HEMISPHERE).

Early Monday (8:30 a.m.) the President welcomed French National Defense Minister Rene Pleven to Washington. Then he bundled Mamie, his mother-in-law, daughter-in-law and the grandchildren aboard the Columbine, flew off for a restful week or more (depending on the international situation) on the golf links at Augusta, Ga. Ike emerged from the plane carrying his golf shoes, was warming up on the links with Ben Hogan within the hour.