THE LAW: Birthday Present for Harry

For 17 years the U.S. Government has been attempting to deport Harry Renton Bridges, a native of Australia, whose rise to labor leadership—he has bossed West Coast longshoremen since 1934—was achieved with Communist help. The basic complaint: that Bridges himself is a troublemaking Communist.

Backed by his International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union, Bridges beat the Government in 1939, 1945 and 1953. Last month in San Francisco, the Government gave Bridges another whirl. It sought his deportation on the grounds that he had lied in denying he was a Communist, or had been a Communist, during his naturalization in 1945.

Last week, the day after Bridges' 54th birthday, Federal Judge Louis E. Goodman read his ten-page verdict. Its substance: the Government had failed to prove Bridges' "membership in the Communist Party by clear and convincing evidence." "How's that for a birthday present, Harry?" shouted a longshoreman. Grinned Bridges: "That's great."