Red Hats for the U. S.?

For the second time within a year, New York's Archbishop Francis Joseph Spellman was out in the warring world last week. The flying prelate (he once held a pilot's license) is Military Vicar of all Roman Catholics in the U.S. armed forces. Bent on visiting as many of them as he can, he stopped first in North Africa, then flew on to Italy. He visited the Fifth Army's General Headquarters just behind the firing line, had lunch with King George VI and Lieut. General Mark W. Clark, offered an afternoon Mass for servicemen.

Archbishop Spellman had three audiences with Pope Pius XII. What the Archbishop and his great & good friend discussed was known only to themselves. But the question of Cardinals for the U.S. may have been mentioned. Since the death of Boston's William Cardinal O'Connell (TIME, May 1), the U.S. has had only one Prince of the Church, instead of its normal three or four. He is Philadelphia's aging (79) Denis Cardinal Dougherty.*

Depleted College. The Sacred College of Cardinals now has only 42 members, the fewest in a century. Full strength is 70, the number set in 1586 by Pope Sixtus V to commemorate the 70 elders of Moses. But there are always at least half a dozen "vacant hats" so that when a Pope dies his successor may make some immediate appointments.

Of prospective U.S. candidates for the red hat, two are virtual certainties: Archbishop Spellman and Chicago's Archbishop Samuel Alphonsus Stritch. Both, as a matter of fact, may now be Cardinals in petto, i.e., in the Pope's breast.

* First U.S. Cardinal created (1875) was New York's John Cardinal McCloskey. There have been only six others: New York's Farley and Hayes, Chicago's Mundelein, Boston's O'Connell, Philadelphia's Dougherty, Baltimore's Gibbons.

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