editorial

"See that your judgments are your own; and do not shrink from disagreement."

Lord Acton

Of course, it is considered impolite to say I told you so-even when it is true. But in the matter before us, if anything may be gained or any lesson learned by our doing so, this might be the appropriate occasion for us to run the risk of being considered ill-mannered.

When ONE first set about its task of helping homosexual men and women, there was a great deal of distrust among our people of all public officials no matter how puny. The distrust was largely justified at the time, and the need for continued wariness has in no degree lessened. Nor has ONE ever failed to advise caution and circumspection where a homosexual's interests or activities might cause him to come under the scrutiny of any one of our public custodians. From snoopy postal inspectors to "sympathetic" health investigators, the whole lot is not to be trusted with knowledge of our personal lives. Is this so difficult to understand? After all, the first duty of every public official is to the welfare of the community, and as long as the homosexual act is a felony punishable by prison sentences in most states, the public official is required to act against the interests of homosexual men and women whether he wants to or not. The public official like Dr. Walter Smartt, head of the Los Angeles County Health Dept. VD Section, who is quoted in a recent Mattachine Newsletter as saying to a Mattachine representative that if the police suddenly showed up and demanded the health records of one of his patients "I'd burn them," is simply talking nonsense. And if he means what he says, his answer should be investigated for he is not fit to serve his office.

The point is that ONE has been the only organization saying these things until recently. We have been severely criticized for our uncooperative and unyielding stand too. But our judgment was not wrong. The U.S. Supreme Court's refusal to hear the case of John Darnell III convicted of sending obscene material via first-class mail has now scared the daylights out of the fast operating pen pal clubs. And the discovery by the naive that it is perfectly legal for every federal agency and every

one