ROANOKE TIMES 

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, August 19, 1994                   TAG: 9408190102
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                 LENGTH: Medium

CLINTON YIELDS ON CRIME BILL

President Clinton and Democratic congressional leaders emerged from an emergency White House meeting Thursday with what aides said was a compromise that could gain enough Republican converts to rescue the crime bill and win House passage by early next week.

It appeared the White House was resisting any broad compromise and seeking to win just enough Republican votes to let the president claim victory.

A senior White House official said the package would include about $2.5 billion in cuts in the crime-prevention programs that have been the main target of Republican criticism.

It would ease only slightly the ban on 19 types of assault weapons. Forty-eight conservative Democrats who oppose the ban joined the Republican leaders to deal the president a major defeat last week by voting to keep the bill from debate on the House floor.

The White House plan would give Congress the power to review, and reject, new regulations banning 19 styles of assault weapons to determine exactly which models should be outlawed.

The new White House proposal stops far short of the multibillion-dollar cuts urged by Rep. Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., the administration's chief foe in a weeklong battle over the crime bill.

Clinton aides said that the plan produced Thursday had been hammered out to meet conditions set by Republicans they have identified as those most likely to switch to Clinton's side.

Clinton has devoted nearly all of his time for a week to reviving the measure.

Debate now may focus on whether by agreeing to trim what had been a $33 billion bill by nearly 10 percent overall, Clinton has agreed to allow the ``massive cuts'' that the White House said only two days ago that he would not permit.

Even by the most optimistic White House calculations, the battle will continue for at least the next three days. Clinton scheduled a news conference today to try to maintain pressure on his foes. 


 by CNB