News stories from Saturday November 17, 1979
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- The release of the blacks and women among the hostages held at the American Embassy in Teheran was ordered by Ayatollah Khomeini, according to the students who holding them captive. The Ayatollah's son, Ahmad, told reporters last night that the hostages would not be released immediately, but "maybe tomorrow."
President Carter welcomed the report that some of the hostages in Teheran would be released, but administration officials warned that the their release did not mean that an end to the crisis was near. They said that "the United States will continue to work in every channel open to it" for the release of all the hostages.
[New York Times] - Ronald Reagan defeated John Connally in a Florida Republican Convention presidential straw poll despite Mr. Connally's all-out effort. Mr. Reagan got 36 percent of the vote to Mr. Connally's 27 percent and George Bush got 21 percent. The convention was attended by 1,300 delegates. [New York Times]
- Congressional aid in easing obstacles in the form of legal and environmental restrictions that could impede the deployment of the MX mobile intercontinental missile is being sought by the Defense Department. The Pentagon is drafting a measure, known as the "MX Mobile Missile System Basing Act," that would ask Congress to allow the Air Force to sidestep environmental and land management laws that could delay the deployment of the land-based missile. [New York Times]
- A libel suit was won by a physician who had sued four former students at University of Kansas Medical School who had charged him with discrimination when he was a department chairman there. Dr. Dante Scarpelli was awarded a total of $44,000 in damages. Lawyers for the defendants, who are now physicians, said that case was an important test for affirmative action programs, because it would have a national impact on the ability of minority students to seek redress for alleged racial discrimination. [New York Times]
- Thousands of Puerto Ricans vowed they would avenge the death of a Socialist who was found hanged in a federal prison in Florida where he was serving a six-month sentence for allegedly trespassing on Navy property in Puerto Rico during military maneuvers. About 8,000 militant supporters of independence for Puerto Rico attended the funeral of Angel Rodriguez Cristobal in his hometown. They insist that he was murdered. [New York Times]
- Nearly 85,000 adult mental patients have been released "to the community" by New York state's psychiatric hospitals in the last four years, and it is estimated that 40,000 of these former patients are in New York City. The patients were released under a policy adopted a decade ago that was meant to be more humane than long-term hospitalization. [New York Times]
- The leaders of South Korea's long-estranged political parties have agreed to form a special National Assembly committee that will work for revision of the Constitution and restoration of democratic government. [New York Times]