European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - February 8, 1988, Darmstadt, Hesse The stars and stripes pays 10 columns William f. Buckley or. Monday february 9,1988 two terms is Long enough for any president or. Reagan has several Tim i recorded till opposition to the 22nd amendment id Trie Constitution which prohibits a president from running Tor a third irm. He has made it Clear thai even assuming the amendment were repealed yesterday or that it had never been enacted he would not himself run Tor a third term. He says this plausibly because of his age. If he were the age of Theodore Roosevelt when he left office having served almost a full two terms Mckin Ley was shot six months after his inauguration one would Greet the disavowal of ambition so optically no Reagan believes it. He will Tell you that the american people have the right w vote w Many times As they like not Only for a senator or representative but also for a president i intend to Campaign when i gel out of her on the reminded that Trade lion Tan achieve the same prestige As Taw he replies that the tradition was set by George Washington at a time when people were afraid of the restoration of the monarchy. When Franklin Roosevelt decided to run fur a third term he routed the tradition and during the Campaign of i to much was made of for s narcissism. By the time the fourth term came up Roose velt was confirmed in the Imperial manner sometimes acting in such o Way Asta betray what Karl with Fogl has called the megalomania of the aging despot. Rea Gan is Quick to acknowledge that no Man whose health is flagging should run for the presidency. At the time Roosevelt ran in iw4, his doctors had privately confided to him that he was hot fit to spend More than him hours a Day at work. If he had spent four hours a Day we d have lost Western Europe also notwithstanding this considerable Rympo slurp to run for office As a Well Man while your whale body is palpably atrophy in Roosevelt s supporters decried the 22nd amendment. Elmer Davis called it an act of retroactive they could never beat him while he was alive Davis said so they beat him after he was dead. But it is by no Means certain that n know Voll. Running in 1983, could bring off a third Lerm. What Reagan fails to take into account 1 think is the political metabolism of the american people we arc a culture that refuses to permit a morning news How to prolong a segment beyond six minutes whether Reagan delivers a 30-Minutc speech or a three minute speech he will receive maximum 90 seconds on the evening news programs. This appetite for dispatch in the handling of the news accelerated during the 60s. Ii was t until the 70s that the net works resolved on the i minute maximum segment in the morning television shows if Pythagoras up . Rosenthal Stop me if none me Ruth Elemir school Proa ache winced budget pc Rcd on a morning news program and had Only got to two tides of his Triangle at six minutes we d never know about the third Side. That theatrical imperative for a change affects the Public appetite for yet another presidential Lerm. Reagan would no doubt reply that if that were so Why let the people proceed o defeat the candidate seeking a third term. The trouble with this is that an incumbent is normally situated to enforce his own renomination which has the effect if a third term is frowned upon of imposing a disqualifying Burden on a party whose principles May tac popular. The volatility of Public approval of a president s performance is illustrated by Reagan s own most re cent ratings. After the Stock Market crash in october he fell to 45 percent approval. After he wined and dined Gorbachev he shot up to is percent. Today he is at to. Harry Truman had 25 percent approval when he left office. That was just one More Point than Ninon had when he was forced to resign from office. From such figures or can t deduce an Over powering popular mandate for a third term. Johnson could have run again and elected not to do so yielding his scat 10 a Republican. Ike could not have run again but his successor was a Democrat. If one is to stare at the figures Long and hard enough they begin to took like Tea leaves. And they say to this soothsayer two terms is enough for a president. And if we Are going to change he Constitution let s have a three term limit for senator and a five term limit for congressmen. I can think of any number of congressmen for whom Reagan would Welcome such a limitation. Human Sou is More important than a contract most of the important news modes journalists Deal with Are sad or dreary. People Are killed hijacked swindled. Nations go to War or spend their energies and fortunes preparing for it earthquakes explosions plagues everybody is always saying some thing Nasty about somebody else. That s the Way things Are in the world or that is How it Comet out by the Lime we Are finished slicing it up into words or Pic Tures. But once in a while something happens that sings of creativity or Energy or wit simple goodness and insist on Laking hold of us and mating us feel Happy. A great play opens thai is news and joyous. A country South Korea say lifts itself out of decades of War nibble and tyranny builds economic decency and mans building political decency. One of the happiest stories in decades was the first voyage of Man to the Moon. How excited we All were in the newsroom How exhilarated by the realization of Man s reach. The Only Way we knew to express it was to commission a poem by Archibald Macleish and put it on the front Page. We even made him stand by at nit phone during the night in fast the news changed a task carefully written an the assignment Succi update 1 wish i could write or commission a poem for chief Justice Kobyn a Wal Cilz and his sin colleagues on the new Jersey supreme court. They gave us All some Happy news by voting 7-0 that mercy compassion and human dignity arc indeed pan of the Law and must be observed particularly by judges. The decision was about paying a woman to Bear a child illegal they ruled in the stale of new Jersey. It was also about the rights of motherhood. They ruled that no contract could be enforced that deprives n Mother of her parental rights not in new Jersey the Case of course dealt with the child who became known around the world As baby m. The Mother Mary Beth Whitehead Gould signed an agreement in Jar which she would be paid 110,000 to be inseminated with the sperm of or. William Stern and Bear a child that would be turned Over to him and Bis wife when the baby was born while head Gould changed her mind. She wanted to keep the baby. A lower court judge whose name ii Harvey Sorkow ruled that a contract was 3 contract and turned the baby Over to Stem then the judge really stuck it to Mary Beth Whitchead Gould. In minutes it rammed through an adoption process that usually lakes weeks and made mrs. Sli in the Legal Mother. He ruled that Mary Beth and her baby could never Sec each other again. He terminated her As i Mother just terminated tier. And Ihen be denounced her As manipulative aggressive and impulsive. His language shocked laymen and even lawyers wearily accustomed to the cruelly of so Many judges toward helpless witnesses and defendants. The supreme court of new Jersey allowed Stern to keep custody but struck Down the attempt by Sorkow to deny the very existence of Mary both Whithead Gould As a Mother. It withdrew recognition of mrs. Stern As the Legal Mother and restored it o the woman who bore the baby. The court ordered hearings held on the Mother s visiting privileges but not by Sorkow. Split Custo Dies Are not always healthy for the children but the court s decision was Wise. The stems May provide bet Ter surroundings than could the natural Mother who has since remarried but that gives nobody the right to separate Mother and child forever. It was an Art of judicial anger and to do so in the first place Wilc Nti s court is respected in the country. The decision that surrogacy for Money is simply child Sale and therefore illegal will certainly be accepted in Many Stales. Unpaid surrogacy is still Legal but there will be Lillic profit in it for the baby brokers who will have to find a new Way of making a Dollar but he reason the seven judges deserve a poem Gors beyond surrogacy what they really did was Rale thai i human soul is More important than a contract that sorrow s philosophy that a Deal is a Deal is wrong when the Deal involves the Selling of a human being. Seven Loiero wrong. And while they were at it hey put in a critical word about the Etc ration of the Mother by the judge. This should do something for sorrow s temper or at Trail its Public display. And it is a reminder to every judge that the people who stand before the Bench have a very important thing in common with the person who sits behind it the right to be treated with dignity and respect. What rhymes with the supreme court of new Jersey
