Editorials
Contents Volume CVI, Number 18 commonweal Correspondence ...
...Seeing the report in a gossip manageable, but as the Hibakusha reach their middle and later column, Miss Seberg went into labor prematurely and the baby years, they report greater susceptibility to disease, and a died soon after birth-to be buried, reportedly, in a glass slower recovery rate from illness...
...limit on individual contributions to one campaign, as compared with the $5000 a Poetry: John Fandel Staff: Karen F. S'ilva, Harriette Balsky, political action committee is allowed to give...
...that our society will and should be judged...
...Telephone: direct-mail experts from extending more than $1000 credit to candidates for more (212) MU 3-2042...
...citizens of Japanese ancestry studygressmen to be more responsive to oil money or various special ing or working in Japan when World War II broke 'out and interests than to their constituents or to their national party postwar brides of U.S...
...ings...
...foreign, $22...
...to suicide...
...W. S. Di Piero 567 The percentage of money raised by congressional candidates from PAC's has Why Catholic: Dennis O'Brien 568 doubled since 1972 to about 25 percent in the 1978 elections...
...Special two-year rate: $35...
...Over a three year period the AMA's political action commitExecutive Editor-,Peter Steinfels Assistant Editors: Daniel M. Murtaugh, tee contributed more than $100,000 to the members of the committee handling the David Toolan bill...
...servicemen and civilians exposed to radiation at the Defense Department's nuclear weapons testing sites have led many others to realize that they are also Hibakusha...
...10016...
...Single copy, $1...
...VICTIMS STILL IN NEED OF CARE The compromise bill now before Congress has much to commend it, even with the addition of amendments designed ROUGH LARGELY unknown to their fellow citizens, to sweeten the measure for opponents...
...Every year thereaf- They vividly recall the monstrous injuries, deaths and linter, said Romain Gary, her second husband, the actress at- gering radiation poisoning of the A-bomb shocks...
...have been medically registered as A-bomb sufferers by the Newspaper readers know the story...
...This for public financing of congressional campaigns, modeled on struggle is now at a new turning point with medical relief that already followed in presidential races...
...But for now that reform seems impossible to vanced non-military medical circles of North America...
...ridden Hibakusha attribute their complaints to the holocaust...
...The need for sophisticated knowledge about radiaTHE SEBERG CASE tion dangers and for treatment of radiation-related illness is now more than ever urgent...
...The biggest growth is Ashes/7 Years from Somewhere: in corporate PAC's: in four years time their number has escalated from 89 to 821...
...It would markedly cut 1,000 or more survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki the flow of PAC funds and reduce the present tendency toward atomic bomb catastrophes lead lives of physical, emoWashington-based centralization of PAC activity...
...They find tempted suicide on the anniversary of the baby's death, failing their own terrible pains, for the most part, undiagnosed by the in each attempt...
...560 ACTION COMMITTEES Television: Philip Tertian 561 Terrorism in fiction: Desmond O'Grady 562 HE POST-WATERGATE reforms in federal election laws are producing one result few counted on: a phenomenal growth in political action committees, espeBooks cially those financed by corporations and trade associations...
...Contents Volume CVI, Number 18 commonweal Correspondence 546 Editorials 547 A-bomb survivors: Stephen Saloff 548 Parliament U.S-style: Brian Wicker 549 Wolfe in orbit: Thomas Powers 551 Opening Pandora's box: Murray Polner 553 It just isn't working: Harry A. Marmion555 'It happens all the time': Katharine Byrne 557 CURBING POLITICAL Stage: Gerald Weales 559 Screen: Colin L. Westerbeck, Jr...
...when a senator legislation before Congress...
...Already endorsed by 130 House members, the bill would do the following: cut in half the amount political action committees could contribute to a Commonweal, A Review of Public Affairs, Literature and the Arts, is published biweekly, except candidate in both the primary and general elections...
...Five years ago, when the electoral reform issue first came up, PAC's contributed $12.5 million to Hollywood Hagiography: congressional candidates...
...A few weeks ago she finally succeeded in the medical profession, so it is not surprising that the anxietyeffort...
...Repeated efforts since that time to extend public financing to House and Senate races have failed with resistance traditionally coming from members Nuclear politics elected from safe disticts, Southern and urban Northern Democrats who feared that the availability of public money would encourage strong opposition at election time-which TA-BOMB SURVIVORS may well be true, and a good thing too...
...failed...
...Its Abigail McCarthy, Thomas Powers authors suggest a heavy dose of deregulation and the tripling of the current $1000 Movies: Colin L. Westerbeck, Jr...
...coffin to demonstrate that it was not black...
...most imtional, and financial hardship here in the United States...
...But in another way it is in such "little" things deficiencies and physical deformities...
...Their daily lives are for the most part by a Black Panther leader...
...and prohibit the committees, consultants and son Ave., New York, N.Y...
...Editorial Assistant: Anne Robertson A recent Harvard study suggests that the post-Watergate electoral reform laws Columnists: John Garvey, Frank Getlein, have inherent weaknesses that have helped to produce the proliferating PAC's...
...Corporate A Life of Christ/Man of Nazareth: Paul Wilkes PAC's seek specifically economic goals on a strictly quid-pro-quo basis, and their 574 ten-fold growth since 1975 is a good indication that they are succeeding...
...In one way this is an insignificant story...
...We are still convinced, we should add, of the need a tenacious struggle to obtain adequate medical care...
...effort to revise the electoral system...
...A new charter for And yet, if the Hibakusha openly reveal their tragic histories the FBI that would prevent such abuses is currently being and distressing psychic trauma, insurance companies may considered in Congress...
...I've Done So Well - Why Do I Feel So Bad?: This mushrooming of special interest money for congressional campaigning is a Carlo A. Weber 570 matter of real concern, and the growth of corporate PAC's especially so...
...564 Last year political action committees handed out $35 million...
...servicemen, have long been engaged in leadership...
...Colin L. Westerbeck, Jr...
...In the past, the special interests concentrated on contributions to presidential candidates, but in 1976 presidential elections were 12 October 1979: 547 placed under public financing...
...The FBI tried to drive Martin Luther King, Jr...
...In this connection a compromise bill Jacqueline Reeves which applies only to House campaigns offers some promise-indeed, it offers what Advertising Manager: Ruth E. Taylor is probably the last opportunity the 96th Congress will have to restrict special Publisher: Edward S. Skillin interest giving...
...it The Hiroshima and Nagasaki victims residing in the U.S...
...medical claims of U.S...
...Since they were the actress because she supported the black nationalist cause, strong enough to break their roots and emigrate, their number...
...foreign, $39...
...seeking reelection spends almost $7,000,000 or $13 a vote to Until recently, the poorly understood maladies of these buy a second term, as happened in 1978, something is radiA-bomb survivors were considered idiosyncratic even in adcally wrong...
...Subsequently the measure was defeated in that committee by one vote...
...As things stand now, altogether too many congresnuclear radiation and to recognize a clear syndrome of sional decisions seem to be bought and sold by political action maladies arising from nuclear radiation...
...in 1970 it spread information that was false and known to be automatically excludes the grossly injured and sufferers of false, to the effect that she was pregnant not by her husband but acute radiation diseases...
...But the achieve, and the present House legislation represents a positive and much needed step to curb PAC power, at least to some Japanese term " Hibakusha," literally "A-bomb received person," is now entering general use to designate all victims of extent...
...As an example, Common Cause cites last year's bill designed to hold down hospital costs, a crucial issue in the drive for national Staff health insurance, and one which could save hospital patients $27 billion over the next five years...
...and than 30 days-a very important provision...
...In an effort to discredit Ministry of Health and Welfare of Japan...
...This bill is the culmination of a five-year Canada, $20...
...Chief opponent of the measure, of course, was the American Editor: James O'Gara Medical Association...
...An exclusion clause in many Blue Cross health insurance Commonweal: 548...
...Labor Rise Gonna Rise: Ed McConville 572 union, professional organization and single-interest PAC's at least represent individual citizens who join together to promote a common political interest...
...Undesirable Alien: Ronald Christ 574 Are PAC's in general effective...
...In the case of Jean Seberg, however, it may have are a special group among the nearly 370,000 survivors who succeeded...
...These portant, it would work against the growing tendency of con- victims, principally U.S...
...Two years later that amount had risen to $22.6 million...
...Yearly subscriptions, U.S...
...The serious nuclear committees, and their growth, phenomenal as it has been, has reactor accident at the Three Mile Island power station and the just begun unless action is taken...
...put a $50,000 limit on the monthly Christmas-New Year's and July and Au- amount a candidate could receive from the committees (some candidates have gust, by Commonweal Publishing Co., 232 Madi- received more than twice that sum...
...Compared to the Any symptom, to the Hibakusha, is a possible sign of premaslaughter in Vietnam, to the plight of the boat people, the slow ture death, and their worries are heightened by apprehension starvation of the Cambodian people, one death does not add up that their children and grandchildren may suffer serious health to very much...
...Remember Jean Seberg" might be a cancel or raise the cost of their health coverage, or amend good message for wavering Congressmen who think the pro- policies to exclude infirmities resulting from the atomic bombposed charter is somehow too hard on that organization...
Vol. 106 • October 1979 • No. 18
