Letters, Sep. 19, 1960

Ladies' Days

Sir:

Your Sept. 5 article, "As Maine Goes," recalled to me March 3, 1913 (the day before Woodrow Wilson took office), when several hundred women in Government service marched in a suffrage parade down Pennsylvania Avenue.

We were uniformed according to departments, in capes of different colors, and presented a well-organized parade until we approached the Treasury, where men from the sidelines ran forward and broke it up.

The Interior Department approved our marching and gave us time off for the parade (though charging it to annual leave), which was watched by many thousands.

FLORENCE P. WHITE Organton, N.C.

Sir:

In your splendid article on women in politics, you mention Rudd Smith, running for Congress in our 21st District. I think you will find she is Rudd Brown, wife of Harrison Brown of Caltech.

LAURA G. BENJAMIN

Los Angeles

TIME'S face is Rudd.—ED.

Sir:

We were surprised that you did not mention the League of Women Voters of the U.S., the outgrowth of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, and frequently the training ground of women in politics.

League members in 50 states and the District of Columbia (a singularly non-corsage-bearing group) work unceasingly on issues of government, and it seems to us that issues will elect the next President of the United States.

(MRS.) JEAN A. KEENEY President

League of Women Voters of Oak Lawn Oak Lawn, 111.

Billy on Religion & Politics

Sir:

I emphatically deny that I plunged into American politics as stated in TIME, Aug. 29 —or that I had Senator Kennedy solely in mind when I made my remarks. A reporter asked if I thought religion was a legitimate issue in a political campaign. I answered: "A man's religion cannot be separated from his person; therefore where religion involves political decision it becomes a legitimate issue. For example, the people have a right to know the views of a Quaker on pacifism, or a Christian Scientist's view on medical aid, or a Catholic's view on the secular influences of the Vatican."

Then the reporter asked if I thought the religious issue would be very deep this year.

I replied: "Yes. I have been informed by political experts that it will be deeper than in 1928, because people are better informed."

He further asked why Protestants are reluctant to vote for a Catholic. I answered: "Some Protestants are hesitant about voting for a Catholic because the Catholic Church is not only a religious but a secular institution which sends and receives ambassadors from secular states."

I am sure that in the context in which they were given, my remarks throw an entirely different light than the impression left in TIME. I might also add that I deplore all forms of religious bigotry!

BILLY GRAHAM

Basel, Switzerland

The Campaign

Sir:

By now it should be apparent to all that Kennedy's New Frontier is only the wilderness of more and higher taxes.

RUFUS AND THELMA MARTIN Wakarusa, Ind.

Sir:

Your mentioning that Senator Johnson may not be the darling of the South prompts me to send you the following: