Lay That "Modern" Down

Vermont's progressive-minded George D. (for David) Aiken, 64, was something of a "Modern Republican" in the U.S. Senate before Dwight D. (for David) Eisenhower made bird colonel. Last week Aiken applauded the politics represented by the President's favorite ''Modern Republican" term, but favored throwing the term overboard. "It is misleading and is badly misused," Aiken told the Women's National Republican Club in Manhattan. "It irritates a lot of good people."

Aiken read this irritation in stacks of letters from voters; their definitions of New or Modern Republicanism "ranged all the way from a reincarnation of the Franklin D. Roosevelt era to a very liberal interpretation of Karl Marx." Now that a G.O.P. Administration has made a record for four years, Aiken believes that modifiers in front of the party's name serve only to divide its members. His suggested substitute: just plain "Republican."

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