GOVERNMENT BY INTEREST

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

Mr. Theodore Chase, Jr., whose eminence as a spokesman for the Republican Party hardly requires explanation, has done us all a great service by engaging in debate with the erstwhile London Times of Harvard, the CRIMSON. There can be no question but that more public debate of the significant issues which today confront the nation would be a healthy phenomenon at the leading institution of higher education....

Mr. Chase, whose most recent dabbling in political theory has left him with nothing more concrete than a vaguely, and I suspect, instinctively anti-democratic bias, might do well to read some of the writings of Mr. Malcolm Moos, of late Mr. Eisenhower's chief political speechwriter. For Mr. Moos, far from being a defender of the public interest, is rather a passionate advocate of government by interest group (and, one suspects, the bigger the interest, the more of the government it should run). If we were to compare Mr. Moos's views with those of another political scientist, say, Professor James McGregor Burns of Williams, whose book, Congress on Trial I would recommend to Mr. Chase, we would find a startling contrast in their respective theories of the public interest.

And to whom does Mr. Burns serve as advisor? Why, none other than the very same Senator Kennedy whom Mr. Chase so vehemently berates. Might we not query Mr. Chase as to how he accounts for Senator Kennedy's vote in favor of the St. Lawrence Seaway. . . . Or let us consider the Senator's prophetic call for Algerian self-determination--to whose selfish interests was he pandering then, all those "piggish, self-centered" Algerian voters in Boston? . . . Not to mention the Senator's courageous stand on the National Defense Education Act's inexcusable loyalty oath and affidavit provisions--undoubtedly brought about by pressure from "Boss Pusey."

No, Mr. Chase, if you are so earnest an advocate of the liberal concept of the public interest, you are a member of the wrong political party. Nonetheless, I am bound to say that the Republican Party is fortunate in having so able an apologist. It needs the best. --Derek Torrey Winans '61,   President, Harvard Young Democratic Club.