(Testimony of Prof. Revilo Pendleton Oliver)
Mr. Jenner.
Your knowledge of human nature and history and the sources of information you have already told us about?
Mr. Oliver.
That is right.
Mr. Jenner.
Were there any others, that is sources?
Mr. Oliver.
No.
Mr. Jenner.
Now, we will pass to page 18. There is a column headed "Three Exlanations". Do you find it?
Mr. Oliver.
Right.
Mr. Jenner.
It reads in part, "Why was Kennedy murdered by the young Bolshevik? With a little imagination it is easy to excogitate numerous explanations that are not absolutely impossible. For example, (a) Oswald was a madman who acted all alone just to get his name in the papers; (b) Oswald was a poor shot who was really trying to kill Governor Connally or Mrs. Kennedy, and hit the President by mistake; (e) the person killed was not Kennedy but a double and the real Kennedy is now a guest aboard a flying saucer, on which he is heroically negotiating with Martians or Saturnians to save The World, cap 'T', cap 'W'. With a little time and a fairly wide reading in romantic fiction anyone can think of 60 or 70 fantasies as good Or better than those that I have mentioned."
And the next paragraph:
"On the evidence, however, and with the consideration of human probabilities there are only three explanations that are not preposterous, viz :"
To what did you refer when you used the reference "On the evidence." ?
Mr. Oliver.
On the evidence that I had already stated.
Mr. Jenner.
You mean that which you have stated here in the course of the testimony?
Mr. Oliver.
Yes; and also stated in this article. That is, the evidence that has been stated; my testimony has related to the previous parts of this article.
Mr. Jenner.
That is pages 13 through 17 and up to this point on page 187
Mr. Oliver.
Yes.
Mr. Jenner.
You were using the term "evidence" in the general or loose sense?
Mr. Oliver.
Yes, not in the sense of sworn testimony as a lawyer would use it.
Mr. Jenner.
Yes, not in the sense of primary sources, is that correct? -
Mr. Oliver.
Yes. Of course, we run into a curious question, the definition of primary sources. There are many modern historians who would list the newspapers, for example, as primary sources.
Mr. Jenner.
Depending on their use, yes.
Mr. Oliver.
As distinct from, let us say, textbooks which would be secondary sources. I am here assuming primary sources means some direct positive evidence other than the printed reports, et cetera.
Mr. Jenner.
I don't wish to compromise you, of course. When I use the term "secondary" or "pri mary" sources I am using it in a sense that a lawyer uses it. Newspaper reports we would generally refer to as secondary sources. We would have to go to the primary source on which the reporter based his article in order to get something in evidence.
If we were trying to prove a general milieu, newspaper accounts as to an atmosphere at a particular time or something of that nature they would be admissible. But as to your sources here, I understand the term secondary sources means newspaper reports, articles or even books on which you retired, as distinguished from personal knowledge.
Mr. Oliver.
That is right. I just wanted to be sure this was no misunderstanding of the term.
Mr. Jenner.
I don't wish it misunderstood either. I am not going to read your three suppositions, they are your conclusions rather than statements of fact. I use the word supposition in the sense that I am thinking in terms that they are your conclusions.
Mr. Oliver.
That is right.
Mr. Jenner.
Your conclusion first is, and I quote, "Kennedy was executed by the Communist conspiracy because he was planning to turn American." What was it, your source of that statement?
Mr. Oliver.
Well, as I have indicated; what I called there the comforting hypothesis that one heard so frequently since Kennedy's inauguration, and which one still hearS, that he had in his mind a secret plan, that his policies and
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