Mr. LIEBELER. You did not get the impression, however, that he was emotionally involved in any significant extent with either of the two sides? Would that be a fair statement?
Mr. LIEBELER. Did you also have the impression that Oswald would not be influenced against the Soviet Union by anti-Soviet Union propaganda that might be disseminated in the country?
Mr. BALLEN. Definitely he would make the decisions for himself and would consider himself much more of an expert than anyone in the United States, including our Government.
Mr. LIEBELER. You would say that Oswald would not likely be influenced by propaganda of this sort?
Mr. BALLEN. He forms his own conclusion in his own way, and he didn't appear to me, either by his use of language or any other reference, to be particularly informed, particularly learned, but he did impress me as a man who was going to make up his own mind in this own way, and these tendencies were so pronounced that I felt I didn't want to involve him in my firm, which means a team operation.
Mr. LIEBELER. Did Oswald appear to be a particularly intelligent person or did you form an opinion as to his intelligence?
Mr. BALLEN. I thought he was of above average intelligence, and the unusual thing that struck me as being particularly unusual was the degree to which he would go for self-education and self-improvement. It was this quality--these qualities which attracted him somewhat to me.
Mr. LIEBELER. Did he appear to be in any way mentally unstable?
Mr. BALLEN. Appeared to be just a little too much a hard head.
Mr. LIEBELER. What makes you say that, Mr. Ballen?
Mr. LIEBELER. Yes, sir; what do you mean by that?
Mr. BALLEN. I--just his general conduct, his general responses, general bearing. He just seemed to be a little too aloof from society, and just seemed to know all things and everything a little too affirmatively, a little too dogmatically, but as far as feeling that he was mentally ill, I didn't come away with that feeling.
Mr. LIEBELER. Do you remember any specific example of his efforts at self-improvement or self-education that you could give us?
Mr. BALLEN. Well, he just indicated a wide range of readership, literature, and the fact that, my impression was one of a little curiosity, a chap out of Fort Worth who would go to the point of reading and becoming familiar with Marxian literature just struck me as someone who was displaying more than the normal amount of initiative.