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<PAGE> PAGE 2
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SIGNATURE CATHY WHITE
TITLE ASST VICE PRESIDENT
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[DESCRIPTION]
October 16, 1996
To the Board of Directors of
Alliance Short Term U.S. Government Fund
In planning and performing our audit of the financial statements of
Alliance Short Term U.S. Government Fund (the "Fund"), one of the
portfolios constituting The Alliance Portfolios, for the year ended
August 31, 1996 we considered its internal control structure,
including procedures for safeguarding securities, in order to
determine our auditing procedures for the purposes of expressing our
opinion on the financial statements and to comply with the
requirements of Form N-SAR, and not to provide assurance on the
internal control structure.
The management of the Fund is responsible for establishing and
maintaining an internal control structure. In fulfilling this
responsibility, estimates and judgments by management are required to
assess the expected benefits and related costs of internal control
structure policies and procedures. Two of the objectives of an
internal control structure are to provide management with reasonable,
but not absolute, assurance that assets are appropriately safeguarded
against loss from unauthorized use or disposition and that
transactions are executed in accordance with management's
authorization and recorded properly to permit preparation of
financial statements in conformity with generally accepted accounting
principles.
Because of inherent limitations in any internal control structure,
errors or irregularities may occur and may not be detected. Also,
projection of any evaluation of the structure to future periods is
subject to the risk that it may become inadequate because of changes
in conditions or that the effectiveness of the design and operation
may deteriorate.
Our consideration of the internal control structure would not
necessarily disclose all matters in the internal control structure
that might be material weaknesses under standards established by the
American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. A material
weakness is a condition in which the design or operation of the
specific internal control structure elements does not reduce to a
relatively low level the risk that errors or irregularities in
amounts that would be material in relation to the financial
statements being audited may occur and not be detected within a
timely period by employees in the normal course of performing their
assigned functions. However, we noted no matters involving the
internal control structure, including procedures for safeguarding
securities, that we consider to be material weaknesses as defined
above as of August 31, 1996.
This report is intended solely for the information and use of
management and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
PRICE WATERHOUSE LLP
