It was an unusual scene for the Navy, traditionally the nation's most class-conscious service. There was its highest officer, his bushy eyebrows knit in concentration, his head tilted to catch each word, as some 1,000 sailors at the San Diego Naval Station met with him to sound off their gripes some general, some highly personal about military life. Quietly and sympathetically, Admiral Elmo ("Bud") Zumwalt responded to each. Clarence Burris, a black cook whose wife had died of cancer and whose three daughters now need his presence, pleaded for a shore assignment, since...
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