Neither Tight Nor Easy--for for Now

Normally opposing factions were unanimous last week in praising President Johnson's appointment of 40-year-old Federal Deposit Insurance Director William W. Sherrill to the Federal Reserve Board. Texas Democrat Wright Patman, an easy-money champion, predicted that Sherrill would be a "fine member," and Charls E. Walker, executive vice president of the American Bankers Association, praised the appointee's "competence and integrity."

Equally happy was the Fed's Chairman William McChesney Martin, who had informally interviewed the prospect over dinner the week before. Sherrill did not understand Bill Martin's interest in him until two days later, when he was called off the golf course and told of the President's announcement. Quipped the new board member: "It was my second round of golf in a year and the President had to catch me."

Texan Sherrill, in fact, had been a tough man to catch ever since the eighth grade, when at 15 he joined the Marine Corps and, before reaching draft age, was fighting on Bougainville. At 17, he landed at Guam and Iwo Jima, where he was winged in the arm. While at a Navy hospital, he took education tests and scored so high that he skipped high school to enter the University of Houston. From there he went to Harvard Business School. Returning to Houston, he became city treasurer and chief administrative officer in four years. Then he joined College Pal Jack Valenti, who later became L.B.J.'s aide, to form the Jamaica Corp., now a multimillion-dollar land-developing company. He also became president of Homestead State Bank. Thus, with experience and contacts, he was a natural in 1966 for L.B.J. to name to the three-man board of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.

Whether Sherrill will be a tight-or easy-money governor of the FRB remains to be seen. For the moment, at least, he is determined to stay unfettered by dogmatic stands on Washington's monetary and banking controversies.

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