Inside Washington

In a key test of White House strength, the Business Roundtable, a group of business leaders concerned with public policy, will decide this week whether or not to support the more moderate alternative to the Clinton health-care plan crafted by Representative Jim Cooper and Senator John Breaux. The White House has no hope of convincing the executives to back the Clinton plan, but it will try to dissuade them from endorsing Cooper-Breaux. Given the Roundtable's influence in Congress, the stakes are high, so Administration officials -- perhaps even President Clinton and Hillary Rodham Clinton -- will lobby heavily.