AWARD DATE: 1968
AWARD NAME: Best Book on Foreign Affairs
AWARD RECIPIENT: George W. Ball
AWARD HONORED WORK: “The Discipline of Power”
Former Under Secretary of State George W. Ball, author of “The Discipline of Power,” is widely experienced in international affairs but quite different from the popular concept of the diplomatic type.
His is a twentieth-century, hands-above-the-table approach to world problems that has little in common with the traditional urbanity and circumlocution of the striped-pants coterie. Directness rather than eloquence marks his speeches as well as his writing, and the average newsman, listening or reading, tends to comment admiringly on his articulate presentations.
Most of his mature years have been steeped in some form of government service in Washington or abroad. He first went there after finishing at Northwestern University, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1930 and a Doctor of Laws degree in 1933. Beginning as a lawyer in the Farm Credit Administration, he moved on to the office of the General Counsel of the Treasure Department, for a year. from 1935 to 1942 he was in private law practice in Chicago.
After Pearl Harbor he returned to Washington as Associate General Counsel of the Lend- Lease Administration, and in 1943 assumed the same position in the Foreign Economic Administration, which had absorbed Lend-Lease. In Paris and London in 1944 and 1945 he served as a civilian with the Air Force Evaluation Board and with the U.S. Strategic Bombing survey, studying the political and economic effects of the air offensive against Germany.
From 1945 to 1961, again in private practice in Washington, he divided his time between the U.S. capital and western Europe, specializing in international law and commercial relations. The Kennedy Administration brought him back to Government service, as Under Secretary of State of Economic Affairs.
In April of 1968, at the request of President Johnson, Mr. Ball took a leave of absence from Lehman Brothers- with whom he is still associated- to head the United States Mission at the United nations. He resigned that post last fall, to work in the campaign of the Democratic nominee, Vice President Hubert Humphrey.
Mr. Ball holds the U.S. medal of Freedom, is an officer of the French Legion of Honor, and has been awarded the Belgian Grand Cross of the Order of the Crown. His Recent book was published by the Atlantic Monthly Press.
Citation for Excellence: John P. Leacacos- World Publishing Company for this book Fires in the In-Basket.
Citation for Excellence: William Manchester, Little, Brown and Company for his book The Arms of Krupp.