Hungarian’s Day in Court Translates Into Freedom

A way with words has rarely been more crucial than in the case of a Hungarian woman who friends say was declared incompetent because psychiatrists couldn’t understand what she was saying. Her plight drew the attention of other Hungarian exiles in the St. Petersburg, Fla., area who championed her cause and were in court recently when a judge ordered the civil rights of Charlotte Constantine restored after providing her an interpreter for the first time since court proceedings began last March. “I love America very much,” Constantine, 68, said through the interpreter after the decision by Judge John R. Ware. “You have a lot of freedoms here. You just have to fight for them every day.” Her friends blame a neighborhood dispute for spurring incompetency proceedings against Constantine, who came to the United States in 1957 in a special amnesty program for freedom fighters and other anti-Communist refugees. After Constantine had been declared incompetent, she had lost virtually all civil rights, including her driver’s license. Her court-appointed guardian had moved her from her home into an adult living facility and had asked the court for permission to sell her car.

--It was a momentous occasion for Leile McBride, crowned Miss Black America in a West Palm Beach, Fla., pageant, but only about 200 people in an audience that had originally numbered 900 were still around to witness her crowning when it finally took place at 1:40 a.m. The program, which began at 7 p.m. Saturday, was scheduled to last up to three hours but stretched into Sunday morning because of technical miscues and numerous retakes for the videotape that will be shown in syndication in February. McBride, of Denver, will receive a sofa and love seat, an Oleg Cassini gown and full-length fox fur coat for winning the competition.

--If it had been a proper birthday party for the woman who created the unsinkable Pippi Longstocking, there would have been a monkey swinging from the chandelier and a horse with its head through the window witnessing the proceedings. As it turned out, the party in Stockholm celebrating the 80th birthday of author Astrid Lindgren only had such people as Swedish Prime Minister Ingvar Carlsson. The creator of the rebellious 9-year-old Pippi, who defies officialdom to live on her own with her beloved animals, said she would be happy when the birthday fuss ended. “I must be the most photographed 80-year-old woman in the world. I hope things calm down tomorrow,” said the writer, whose 35 books have sold 100 million copies in 50 languages.