Wyzanski Turns Down Post As United Nations Delegate

Charles E. Wyzanski, Jr. '27, President of the Board of Overseers and Federal District Judge for Massachusetts, disclosed yesterday that his belief in a non-political judiciary has caused him to turn down an offer of membership on the U.S. delegation to the United Nations for the fall session of the General Assembly.

In a letter to Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, Wyzanski declared that acceptance of the position "would be inconsistent with what I deem to be the deepest moral obligations of my office as a judge of the U.S. Courts."

Wyzanski added that "service on this particular United States assignment would be so apt to have political as well as legal implications" that he could not continue as Federal judge and accept the appointment. It is known that the question of Red China's admission, as well as tensions in the Middle East, will again be on the General Assembly's agenda.

Wyzanski, who is a trustee of Phillips Exeter Academy and the Ford Foundation, is a registered Democrat. His appointment therefore would have given increased bi-partisanship to the delegation, and in the event of a Democratic victory in November, he could have served as liaison to the next administration.

Appointed in 1942

He first heard Thursday night that the Secretary of State, on the recommendation of both Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge '24 and Senator Leverett Salton-stall '14 (R-Mass.), would submit his name to President Eisenhower.

After talking directly with Dulles Friday morning, he reached his decision not to accept later in the day, after he had tried, unsuccessfully, to receive advice from Chief Justice Earl Warren.

Appointed to the bench by President Roosevelt in 1942 at the age of 35, Wyzanski said in his letter that the judges he most admires, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Justice Benjamin Cardozo, and Judge Augustus N. Hand, "have been the strictest in applying to themselves a self-denying ordinance when they were offered attractive posts outside of their courts."

He said, therefore, that he would have to decline the "rare privilege" of "participation in this important international work."