A Declaration of Independence

By Susan Tifft

G.O.P. Senators pick Dole to stand up to the White House

The setting was historically apt. Until the Civil War, the ornate and intimate Old Senate Chamber, its dark wooden desks arranged in semicircles, rang with the spirited oratory of Daniel Webster, Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun. Last week, when the Senate's 53 Republicans gathered in the museum-like room to elect their leader for the next two years, the forensics were apparently no less rousing. Kansan Robert Dole claimed to be thoroughly persuaded by the speech his nominator, John Danforth of Missouri, made on his behalf. "It was so impressive," Dole quipped, "that I ended up voting for myself."

After an hour and a half of secret balloting, a narrow majority of his colleagues followed suit. On the fourth ballot, Dole defeated Alaska's Ted Stevens, his nearest rival, by a vote of 28 to 25. His prize: the powerful post of majority leader, held since 1981 by Tennessee's Howard Baker, who is retiring from the Senate to prepare for a presidential bid in 1988.

Dole, a self-described moderate conservative, emerged victorious from a field of five contenders. Idaho Conservative James McClure was eliminated on the first ballot. (The election rules required that the candidate receiving the fewest votes on each ballot be dropped from the next round.) Pete Domenici of New Mexico was knocked off on the second ballot, and Richard Lugar of Indiana on the third.

That left Stevens, who as majority whip was Baker's assistant during Reagan's first term, in a face-off with Dole. In Stevens' corner was Barry Goldwater of Arizona, who in an effective, if quirky, nomination speech compared the Senate to the Washington Redskins football team and cast Stevens as a man who had valuable experience playing "backup quarterback." But the elder statesman's plug was not enough. Stevens, known for his combustible temper, lost by three votes, and in a display of characteristic crotchetiness, immediately threatened to renew his challenge to Dole in two years.

The majority leader is one of the most influential figures in Washington. On Capitol Hill, he sets the Senate's agenda and decides what bills come to the floor. Although Dole has often joked that "majority pleader" would be a more appropriate title, many Senators chose him precisely for his ability to forge compromises out of seemingly hopeless deadlocks. Said Senator Slade Gorton of Washington: "We picked the individual with the most experience in managing bills on the floor."

Dole had something else going for him: backbone. After President Reagan's landslide reelection, there was concern that the White House would try to steamroller the Senate into meekly supporting Administration policies. The 22 Republican Senators up for re-election in 1986 were worried that Reagan might force them into votes that could damage their chances. In Dole the Senators knew they had a stand-up guy. Said Danforth in his nominating speech: "He can work with the Administration--not cave in to the Administration."

Dole has strong personal ties to the Administration through his wife Elizabeth, who is Transportation Secretary, and a record of support for Reagan's policies. But he has not shied away from strong criticism, particularly on tax and budget matters. Last week Dole said he would put a higher priority on deficit reduction than on tax reform. He also shot down the Administration's plans for deep domestic-spending cuts, promoting instead a freeze on the federal budget. As for the rest of Reagan's second-term program, he promised only to "support it where we can."

Dole's election was also evidence that the Republicans want a leader who can bring a firm hand to the upper chamber, which has grown increasingly unruly in recent years. Within hours of his election, Dole served notice that he intended to get tough on Capitol Hill. "I do believe we spend a lot of time doing very little, and that may be an understatement," he said. "If we really want the discipline, I'm willing to help provide it." The next day, Republican Dan Quayle of Indiana, head of a special bipartisan committee studying Senate procedures, met with Dole and recommended changes that would limit a legislator's committee assignments and cut down on the parliamentary loopholes that allow a lone dissenter to bring the chamber to a standstill. Such internal reforms, however, could be more difficult to pass than a tax-reform package.

Dole, 61, a tall, lean man with a ready grin, spent eight years in the House before winning a Senate seat in 1968. He has a reputation as an adroit legislative craftsman and a fierce competitor. His biting wit is legendary, but the vituperative remarks that earned him the "hatchet man" label as Gerald Ford's 1976 running mate are rare now. More typical is the comment he made last week when his wife presented him with a congratulatory schnauzer named Leader. Deadpanned Dole: "It's an indication of where my leadership is going. Housebroken but not Senate-broken."

For the past four years, Dole has been chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, where he pushed through a major revision of the Social Security system and three tax bills. In 1982 he held weary committee members in an all-night meeting to grapple with a specific provision of a $100 billion tax-hike bill. He then persuaded a coalition of Republicans and Democrats to pass the bill over the protests of practically every special interest in Washington.

Dole is conservative in his voting record, but he has made barbed attacks on supply-side economics and staunchly defends such traditionally liberal measures as the food stamp program and the Voting Rights Act. His eclectic stands have made him a target of the so-called young Turks, a highly vocal group of right-wing Republicans in the House. Charges Newt Gingrich of Georgia, a member of the group: "Dole is the tax collector for the welfare state." Responds Dole: "If you are in the minority, you can put out a lot of newsletters and say, 'I'm for lower taxes.' We have a little different view in the Senate because we're in the majority. We have to be totally responsible from time to time."

Dole's selection as majority leader had a domino effect on key committee chairmanships. Oregon's Bob Packwood, a frequent Reagan critic, will succeed Dole as head of the Finance Committee, wielding power over the Administration's tax-reform plan when and if it is sent to Capitol Hill. "I sort of like the tax code the way it is," Packwood told the Washington Post last week.

Richard Lugar will become chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, ending weeks of speculation that North Carolina's right-wing Senator Jesse Helms, the most senior member of the panel, would exercise his option to head it. The post opened up when Illinois' Charles Percy, a moderate, lost his reelection bid Nov. 6. Some conservatives had been pressuring Helms to take the Foreign Relations post, especially if Lugar won the majority leader election and left Maryland's Charles McC. Mathias, a liberal, in line for the job. Last week Helms quietly urged his backers to vote against Lugar in the majority leader race so that the Indianan could take over the Foreign Relations post while Helms stayed on as chairman of the Agriculture Committee, where he can watch over price supports for North Carolina tobacco farmers.

Alan Simpson of Wyoming, a popular and witty conservative, easily won election as majority whip. But two Northeastern moderates, Rhode Island's John Chafee and Pennsylvania's John Heinz, nosed out Western Conservatives Jake Garn of Utah and Malcolm Wallop of Wyoming for the chairmanships of the Republican Conference of the Senate and the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which serve as the party caucus and fund-raising arm, respectively. Both men are notably less conservative than McClure and Lugar. whom they replace. "The White House is not going to like it." said one moderate Republican Senator.

In fact, White House aides viewed Dole's victory philosophically, feeling that his legislative acumen and credibility on " Capitol Hill will be an overall plus for the Administration. "The only question mark," said one "senior aide, "is whether he is going to run for President." If Dole, who has unveiled ambitions for the White House, does make a bid in 1988, his independence could become more pronounced, making the going rougher for Reagan in the final year of his term.

For now, however. Dole says his first political priority is to retain the G.O.P. majority in the Senate in 1986. And that means keeping the country happy and prosperous.

"We're going to be tough to defeat," he says, "if we keep the deficit down and the economy rolling."

--By Susan Tifft. Reported by Neil MacNeil/Washington

With reporting by Neil MacNeil