Word: rhees
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Hospital Call. Momentarily shaken out of his conviction that his troubles were all the work of "Communist agents," Rhee began to talk vaguely of re-establishing the office of Premier (which he abolished in 1954) and of reducing his own functions as President to those of a symbolic chief of state. But when his long-awaited announcement of plans finally came, it contained only token concessions. Said Rhee: "I have come to think that as President it will be better for me to divorce myself from the [Liberal] Party and seek to serve the nation solely as its chief executive...
...planned to retire eventually, "many" of his colleagues had begged him to stay on for a while. Lee's strong card seemed to be that if he resigned, as well as Chang, the government would be legally obliged to hold new vice-presidential elections-a loss of face Rhee was not yet ready to accept...
...Syngman Rhee had clung to power too stubbornly and manipulated Korea's constitution to his own advantage too often for anyone to be very impressed by his mere promise "to correct the mistakes of the past." At week's end Rhee made his first trip out of the palace since the riots, to pay a tearful hospital call on some of the wounded students. The crowds that had always applauded him in the past now stared in stolid silence...
...shouldered and sil ver-haired, he looks like the dean of a divinity school, is actually a for mer Seoul high school principal who studied law at New York's Manhattan College (1925). Of his seven children, six are U.S. -educated, two are studying for the priesthood. Once Rhee's Prime Minister and trusted lieutenant, Chang rebelled in 1950 when Rhee proposed to alter the constitution to make himself independent of the Assembly; when Rhee's police threatened to ar rest defiant Assemblymen, Chang pru dently took refuge in the American hospital in Pusan...
...years later he openly opposed Rhee's re-election to the presidency, and in 1956 earned Rhee's abid ing hatred by getting himself elected Vice President on the Democratic ticket. Rhee isolated him by excluding him from all participation in govern ment, did not even speak to him except on ceremonial occasions. Then an assassin took a potshot at him, hit ting him in the hand; Chang was so shaken that he retired to his home, surrounded himself with hand-picked bodyguards, and rarely ventured forth. And though he courageously continued to denounce the corruption and brutality...