The Careless Crusader

In his Government service under three Democratic Presidents, James McCauley Landis built an image as a relentless reformer. "He cuts, thrusts and slashes at everything in sight," a friend of his once said. "There's no fooling around with that man."

A Presbyterian missionary's son and a onetime dean of Harvard Law School, Landis was a Federal Trade Commissioner in New Deal days. Under Harry Truman he served as chairman of the Civil Aeronautics Board. Late in 1960, President-elect Kennedy appointed him to investigate all of the Federal Government's regulatory agencies. In his report to Kennedy, Landis charged that the agencies "drifted, vacillated and stalled," and were "subservient" to the business interests they were supposed to regulate. Landis recommended the creation of a lofty new office to oversee all of the regulatory agencies, and businessmen shuddered at the thought that Landis would get the job. But the Administration never adopted that proposal.

Last week Landis was back in the news. In a quiet announcement that seemed designed to pass unnoticed, the U.S. District Attorney in Manhattan said that Landis pleaded guilty to having failed to file federal income tax returns on the $357,927 of income he received from 1956 through 1960. According to Landis' lawyers, he had neglected to pay his taxes only because he was so wrapped up in public affairs.

The proceedings against Landis had been kept extraordinarily quiet by the Kennedy Administration--"boxed in excelsior," as the New York Herald Tribune put it. Newspaper reporters did not even know the hearing was scheduled until after it was over and Landis had departed. But they'll be there for his sentencing on Aug. 30.

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