Cardinals & Dictator

Spain's Dictator Franco showed a victor's magnanimity to the Vatican last week. He let lean, hollow-eyed Francisco Cardinal Vidal y Barraquer, Archbishop of Tarragona—who incurred his enmity by staying neutral during the civil war—return to Spain after five years' exile.

Since Franco now has the kind of concordat he long wanted—which the Vatican long refused to grant him—and last month picked the new Primate of Spain, his relationship with the Vatican has been much more cordial. A further indication of this came last week when Rome heard reports that the new Primate, Archbishop Enrique Pla y Daniel of Toledo, would be made a cardinal before the year's end. If so, his will be the first red hat Pope Pius XII has bestowed.

The same Rome rumors held that several Italian prelates and one other non-Italian, New York's Archbishop Francis J. Spellman, would soon be raised to the College of Cardinals. There are 18 vacancies, but the present Pope has not elevated anyone, because of war conditions "which do not permit freedom of selection in some countries." Reason advanced for the exception in favor of Spain: "the need for a cardinal as head of the Spanish ecclesiastical hierarchy at this difficult moment."

By way of contrast, "fewer than 20" of Spain's 150 Protestant churches were last week reported "open and functioning freely."

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