Letters, Apr. 8, 1946

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No President of Costa Rica has been a fascist, nor could any Chief Executive of my country ever sympathize with the totalitarian nations, because every one of Costa Rica's statesmen is educated in the school of traditional Costa Rican democracy. . . .

Leon Cortes never made any attempts against continental security. As the New York Times said on March 4 of this year, he included in his inaugural address the idea launched by the then President Franklin Roosevelt for the holding of an inter-American peace conference. He worked for the Good Neighbor Policy initiated by the North American President. . . .

I confess to you that all of our Presidents have made errors in the discharge of their duties—who doesn't?—but I wish to state that the foreign policy of all of them has been above reproach. Leon Cortes, in the international field, was a true democrat, as befits a President of Costa Rica.

H. H. BONILLA Consul General of Costa Rica New York City

Sirs:

. . . Leon Cortes Castro has fought totalitarianism bitterly. Overstrain fighting such organizations killed him. . . .

AM ADO JIMENEZ ROSABAL San Jose, Costa Rica

Sirs:

... That stupid label was only a dirty political trick of the Communists and other President Calderon supporters. ... It all began in 1941, when Cortes broke off with his long supporter and follower, Dr. Calderon, who, a short time later, embarked in a complete partnership with Communists. . . .

ALBERTO F. CANAS San Jose, Costa Rica

½ TIME, aware that many sincere democrats supported the late President Leon Cortes Castro, still believes it fair to call him fascist-minded: 1) he accepted political support from a large group who adopted fascist trappings; 2) one of his chief advisers was the German Nazi Max Effinger, who was shipped to the U.S. for internment after Pearl Harbor; 3) he sent his son and political lieutenant to school in Germany and never repudiated the son's enthusiastic reports on Hitler.—ED.

Bartok & Szigeti

Sirs:

I protest! . . . You do [Bela Bartok] a great injustice by saying that "his music got played, if at all, before esoteric little groups of modernist composers and musicians who had built up a tolerance to what the uninitiated regarded as barnyard music" [TIME, March 18].

. . . Bartok was no artificer. He stood for all that was original and individual in music, all that was sincere and direct. . . . He wrote not for the public's hunger for sensualism and eclat. He wrote for himself, to satisfy an inner urge which said he must compose. . . .

I resent also your uncomic use of spaghetti to rhyme with Szigeti. I don't care if it does rhyme, or even if there was no other word to use. It is an insult to one of the finest artists of our times. . . .

CURTIS DAVIS

New York City

½ TIME sees no injustice in its report that the widespread recognition of Bela Bartok's work was belated. As for famed Violinist Szigeti, how about confetti?—ED.

Protestants & Catholics

Sirs: