Friday, Jan. 20, 1961
University Daily Kansan
Page 3
By Calder M. Pickett Acting Dean, School of Journalism
A FEVER IN THE BLOOD, by William Pearson. Avon, 50 cents.
"How many senators can you name who ever got the nomination in the twentieth century? Harding did, sure. Truman did, but he wasn't Senator when he got it. Believe me, Roberto, this is something I've studied. Senators wear the wrong toga. When a state's senator and its governor come from the same political party, it's the governor, not the senator, who controls the most patronage, and contrary to what they tell you in kindergarten, control of a state delegation is not something brought by the stork. Two years from now I want to control ours."
So big Dan Callahan, fighting district attorney, makes the primary race for governor. And it's a brutal, tough, but curiously indecisive race he makes. William Pearson, when he appears unsure how to resolve an enigma, just bypasses it, the way Al Capp extricates his comic strip people when they're in an impossible mess.
Pearson, as the quotation makes clear, did not have the fore-sight to see what would happen in 1960. A senator did make it, and governors were knocked off all over the country. Strange things are happening to American politics. George Leader, triumphant in Pennsylvania, had become a nonentity two years later. Pat Brown is in trouble in California. Loveless couldn't move from the state-house of Iowa to the U.S. Senate. Freeman fell in Minnesota, Docking in Kansas. There seems to be a kiss of death on the governorship these days.
"A Fever in the Blood" is written in recognition of the once well known fact that one got to the White House by way of a prominent governorship. Three men have the "fever" — Callahan; a 50-year veteran of the Senate named Alex Simon who wants to cap his career in the statehouse; Sam Hoffman, a judge who keeps a silver flask in his desk and wouldn't mind having political lightning strike him.
The election campaign involves a murder trial and stacked evidence, a mystery concerning how former OSS man Callahan lost a leg in Italy, a Fourth of July political picnic that is climaxed by the district attorney's car running down a Negro child, and a bribery attempt. In some ways it is a completely cynical novel.
It is cynical because Pearson is telling us that one has to be cynical about politics. Even the fair-haired boy who passes for hero of this novel is making compromises at the end of the book. Are all these compromises necessary? We don't think so. In time they subvert a man, making him a Huey Long or a Bob Munson, the majority leader of "Advise and Consent."
Perhaps this view is idealistic nonsense. Yet there seem to have been many great men who did little compromising—men like the heroes of John Kennedy's "Profiles in Courage." Dan Callahan, William Pearson's district attorney, has greatness in him, but not enough of it to balance the dog-eat-dog thinking that came out of his jungle-like boyhood. Pearson could have given us a tragedy of some meaning if Dan Callahan had been able to realize what had happened to him. As it is, we wind up merely hating the man, and it's hard to have compassion for someone you hate.
Worth Repeating
What, after all, can college teachers hope to achieve during four painfully unsettled years in the life of a student? All that can be done is to set the stage hopefully for a lifetime of study. If a student develops the habit of reading with discrimination, he may be reasonably well educated by the time he is thirty. Independent study provides an impetus in this direction. At the very least, the independent study candidates learn their way around a library—a rare skill, I might add, among young and old.—David Boroff
Editor Wilson Corrected
Editors
An open letter to Ralph Wilson
Dear Mr. Wilson;
When I first read your article about the Campus Police department, I thought that a cub reporter was late with one of his assignments and scraped the bottom of the barrel. But later I found out that you held the position of assistant managing editor of the Daily Kansan. Now don't you think that a reporter in your position should have done a little more research on that article? Let's take a look at some of the facts.
In your article you stated that there were a number of "unsolved crimes." First of all you mentioned a transistor pocket radio valued at $35. The person that took the radio in now in the Lawrence City Jail charged with the theft of the radio.
THE BILLFOLDS TAKEN IN the second Allen Field House robbery, $146.50. The people from whom this money was taken left this money in lockers which were left unlocked. The checks taken were all cashed in Topeka and persons at the places where they were cashed were unable to remember from whom they came. The Kansas Bureau of Investigation was notified at the time of the theft to be on the lookout for these checks.
Eight tickets to the Syracuse game, $28. The theft of these tickets was reported after the game.
A professor's purse and contents $24. The purse was left out in the open and some Klepto took it. Can you hold the department responsible for this?
A FORGER AT THE DELTA Sigma Phi house, $110. A story in your own paper reported that this man had been captured and is now in jail here in Lawrence. Yet you say that this case is unsolved!
The two paintings, $2,000. In the first place the paintings were in a public room which was left unguarded by gallery officials. Anyone could walk in or out and not be noticed. This theft only took place a little over three weeks ago. What do you want, a miracle?
Four-hundred programs for the Nebraska game, $100. Again the theft was reported THE NEXT DAY!!
THE FIRST FIELD HOUSE robbery, $6.845. When this robbery was reported the Lawrence Police Dept., the Douglas County Sheriff, Kansas Bureau of Investigation and the FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION started investigations. Do you expect the KU-PD to publicize this fact?
A string of cat burglaries, $462. The man responsible for these is serving a jail term right now for his crimes.
Items stolen from cars, $200. How many of these cats were left unlocked? If you want the answer, it is close to 8 or 90 per cent!
... Letters ...
Equipment and money from various departments $100. How much of this was left out in the open?
Skeleton, $150. Either the skeleton has been returned or we are the only campus in the world that has a ghost skeleton. This skeleton was returned and has been "back in school" for over a year.
SHOPLIFTING IN THE BOOKstore, $2,000. Mr. J. J. Newcomb, head of the bookstore, does not hold the Campus Police responsible for the policing of the bookstore. He said it is the responsibility of the bookstore to hire a detective to watch for shoplifters. No formal complaint has ever been filed with the department. The only time they have been called in is when a shoplifter has actually been caught.
There are several other factors that should not be overlooked. Many times thefts are not reported for days or even weeks after they have happened. Your paper should also be aware of the fact that there is a state law for bidding the publication of names, etc., of juveniles involved in crimes.
As for the training of the men, they are right now in the process of taking classes from the Federal Bureau of Investigation on crime detection. Each year the men give up their own time to take these courses. And for most of the men this is the third or fourth time that they have done this.
SO AS YOU CAN SEE THESE men are good for something besides writing tickets or directing traffic and all is not as black as you have made it out to be.
Keith Conquest
Prairie Village freshman
I suggest that next time you "look before you leap!"
On Mr. Abels
In reference to the excerpt from Mr. Ed Abels' discourse on integration in Lawrence, Monday, January 16, 1951, we would like to express our opinions.
First of all, Mr. Abels, the people that attend this University are men and women, not boys and girls, as you repeatedly referred to them. And, they do have mature minds in spite of your beliefs. The fact that the sit-in was not an unorganized, on-the-spot movement, but a well mannered thought-out action proves this.
Secondly, it is very obvious, sir, that you do not like nor trust New York. This is your prerogative. But is not your prerogative to use this as a basis for your criticism of facts. There is also a hint that you believe that the New York students of this University have ". . . a highly organized and carefully directed scheme to stir up trouble in the University . . .." We do not believe this, and we think you should have facts before making such an implication.
Your profession is one which is supposedly known for its objectiveness. At times this is accomplished. At this particular time,
namely, your discourse, this is not accomplished.
Also, the point in question is not the fact that there "must be at least a hundred places in Lawrence where anyone can buy a lot of the stuff (beer) if he wants it." This is a very tite observation. The point involved is that a person should be allowed to go into any public place for anything. And, lastly, you yourself said "it is unfair to the school (KU) to have the publicity that gives the wrong impression given prominence in the official school paper." This, sir, is the same thing we say to you about your article! Anthony C. Reed
Hutchinson senior
Jack Viola
Kansas City, Mo.
sophomore
Stan Haywood
Wichita junior
Al Feinstein
Long Beach, N. Y.
junior
. . .
Open letter to Steve Hurst:
New York Ain't So Hot
Editor:
Open letter to Sleeve Hurst.
Maybe it is because I was born and raised in the benighted Midwest, but I don't see exactly what you were driving at in your letter published on 16 Jan. Your field of fire is great; you range from architecture to Castro and really do not make much sense with any of it. Your logic scarcely deserves the name. On one hand, you roundly criticize Mr. Abels for condemning New Yorkers on geographical location but on the other hand you snidely look down your nose at Midwesterners because they are "backward." To prove this contention you offer such absurd proof as clothing styles and architecture.
I MYSELF, AM AN OUT-OF-state student, and I have met and made the acquaintance of both students from Kansas and from New York. With a few exceptions, I consider the Kansas students to be far superior to and more mature thinking than the self-proclaimed intellectuals from New York. Mr. Hurst, you yourself say that New Yorkers have a bad reputation. Maybe you wonder why? Although there are exceptions, they bring most of it on themselves. For the most part they are ill-mannered, uncoath, overbearing, and thoroughly convinced that New York is the center of the universe. From your letter you seem to be the epitome of this booish attitude.
Well, Mr. Hurst, I have been to New York City and if the slums and the filth that I observed there are 50 years ahead of us, then I for one am happy to be "backward."
Well, Mr. Hurst, these are "the facts of life" as I and some of my friends see them. And I truly hope that you don't think that we barbaric Midwesternes are "picking on you physically or mentally."
David Williford
David Winfield
Evansville, Ind., junior
Te Deum
Not because of victories
I sing,
having none,
but for the common sunshine,
the breeze,
the largesse of the spring.
Not for victory
but for the day's work done
as well as I was able;
not for a seat upon the dais
but at the common table.
—Charles Reznikoff
You are young and contemptuous.
If you were the sentry,
you would not fall asleep—
of course.
Wounded
you would not weep.
—Charles Reznikoff
One of my sentinels, a tree,
sent spinning after me
this brief
secret on a leaf:
the summer is over—
forever.
—Charles Reznikoff
The nail is lost. Perhaps the shoe;
horse and rider, kingdom too.
—Charles Reznikoff
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