IN THIS PAPER, PREPARED FOR THE APRIL 1967 TEXAS SYMPOSIUM ON LINGUISTIC UNIVERSALS, IT IS PROPOSED THAT THE GRAMMATICAL NOTION "CASE" DESERVES A PLACE IN THE BASE COMPONENT OF THE GRAMMAR OF EVERY LANGUAGE. IT IS ARGUED THAT PAST RESEARCH HAS NOT LED TO VALID INSIGHTS ON CASE RELATIONSHIPS AND THAT WHAT IS NEEDED IS A CONCEPTION OF BASE STRUCTURE IN WHICH CASE RELATIONSHIPS ARE PRIMITIVE TERMS OF THE THEORY AND IN WHICH SUCH CONCEPTS AS "SUBJECT" AND "DIRECT OBJECT" ARE MISSING. THE LATTER ARE REGARDED AS PROPER ONLY TO THE SURFACE STRUCTURE OF SOME (BUT POSSIBLY NOT ALL) LANGUAGES. BASIC TO THESE ARGUMENTS ARE TWO ASSUMPTIONS NOW TAKEN FOR GRANTED BY GENERATIVE GRAMMARIANS--(1) THE CENTRALITY OF SYNTAX, AND (2) THE IMPORTANCE OF COVERT CATEGORIES. THE AUTHOR PROPOSES "THAT THERE ARE MANY SEMANTICALLY RELEVANT SYNTACTIC REALTIONSHIPS INVOLVING NOUNS AND THE STRUCTURES THAT CONTAIN THEM, THAT THESE RELATIONSHIPS ARE IN LARGE PART COVERT BUT ARE NEVERTHELESS EMPIRICALLY DISCOVERABLE, THAT THEY FORM A SPECIFIC FINITE SET, AND THAT OBSERVATIONS MADE ABOUT THEM WILL TURN OUT TO HAVE CONSIDERABLE CROSS-LINGUISTIC VALIDITY." HE REFERS TO THESE AS "CASE" RELATIONSHIPS AND THE GRAMMAR PROPOSED AND OUTLINED HERE IS "CASE GRAMMAR." THE SUBSTANTIVE MODIFICATION TO THE THEORY OF TRANSFORMATIONAL GRAMMAR WHICH HE PROPOSES AMOUNTS TO A REINTRODUCTION OF THE "CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK" INTERPRETATION OF CASE SYSTEMS BUT WITH A CLEARER UNDERSTANDING OF THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN DEEP AND SURFACE STRUCTURE. THE SENTENCE IN ITS BASIC STRUCTURE CONSISTS OF A VERB AND ONE OR MORE NOUN PHRASES, EACH ASSOCIATED WITH THE VERB IN A PARTICULAR CASE RELATIONSHIP. THE "EXPLANATORY" USE OF THIS FRAMEWORK RESIDES IN THE NECESSARY CLAIM THAT, ALTHOUGH THERE CAN BE COMPOUND INSTANCES OF A SINGLE CASE (THROUGH NOUN PHRASE CONJUNCTION), EACH CASE RELATIONSHIP OCCURS ONLY ONCE IN A SIMPLE SENTENCE. THIS DOCUMENT WILL APPEAR IN "PROCEEDINGS OF THE TEXAS SYMPOSIUM ON LANGUAGE UNIVERSALS, APRIL 13-15, 1967," EMMON BACH AND ROBERT HARMS, EDITORS, HOLT, RINEHART AND WINSTON. (JD)