ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, January 26, 1997 TAG: 9701270112
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: Associated Press
House leaders want to fix an ethics system battered by partisan politics and almost destroyed in the final days of the case against Speaker Newt Gingrich.
One change under discussion: make permanent the type of cost-assessment penalty levied against the speaker for people who mislead the committee or who file frivolous complaints.
Another: a bipartisan agreement barring campaign attacks against ethics committee members over the handling of an investigation.
Rep. Dick Armey of Texas, the Republican floor leader, and House Democratic Leader Dick Gephardt of Missouri are expected to name a bipartisan ethics task force next month. Creating such a group would bring yawns in normal times, but it has great significance now.
Neither party wants a repeat of partisan brawls within the House ethics committee such as this month's brouhaha surrounding the schedule for wrapping up the Gingrich case.
Nor does anyone want future ethics cases to follow the Gingrich investigation into the political arena, where an investigation's merits are fought out on the House floor and in news conferences and election campaigns.
``I'm hoping we're on the other foot now, where we're saying we narrowly avoided an institutional black eye,'' said Rep. Porter Goss, R-Fla. Like most members of the 10-member panel, Goss just finished his unpleasant tour of duty.
Goss decried the ``spectacle'' that sent out the message: ``Congress, which is constitutionally supposed to police itself, cannot do the job.''
Rep. Nancy Johnson, R-Conn., who as committee chairwoman took the brunt of the Democratic attacks, said, ``If partisan conflict intensifies,'' the ethics system ``will not be able to survive.''
Gingrich said last week he hasn't decided how to pay his $300,000 financial penalty, assessed for misleading statements that caused the committee extra work and expense.
As he contemplates whether to use his personal funds, lawmakers are thinking about making cost-assessment penalties a permanent sanction - especially for House members and outside groups who file frivolous complaints.
The reimbursement would be considered different from a fine, an existing penalty reserved for cases of improper personal gain.
The assessment would be aimed at politically inspired or retaliatory complaints, often with nothing backing up claims beyond a newspaper article that may be from a publication associated with a political cause.
``The ethics committee should have the option to make a finding that the complaint was filed frivolously,'' said Rep. Steve Schiff, R-N.M., who is expected to continue on the committee.
``The fact that a complaint was dismissed should not by itself have a penalty,'' he said. ``A frivolous complaint has no sound basis to file it. It would be just to embarrass the member who was targeted.''
Laura Nichols, spokeswoman for Gephardt, said Democrats believe ``the volume of frivolous complaints is troubling, but we don't want it to impede or intimidate people'' with legitimate complaints.
``We need to find a balance,'' she said.
Goss has been working on proposed changes and said it might be necessary to impose a brief ``timeout,'' a moratorium on filing new complaints until changes are made.
The Florida Republican added that the Democratic and Republican leadership must reach a ``gentleman's understanding'' that would prevent them or rank-and-file lawmakers from interfering with ethics cases.
Even worse for Republican ethics committee members, Democratic challengers for their seats made the GOP handling of the speaker's case a major campaign issue. Johnson won her eighth term by only 1,500 votes after her opponent attacked her handling of the investigation.
``You have got to give a member of the ethics committee a free pass from that kind of partisan, political bashing,'' Goss said.
Rep. Martin Frost of Texas, chairman of the Democratic campaign organization, said such an understanding ``would be hard to enforce.''
In 1989, he said, Democratic and Republican leaders agreed that challengers shouldn't attack a recently approved congressional pay raise.
``Some candidates, regardless of what the parties wanted to do, raised the issue,'' he said. ``But it's worth talking about.''
LENGTH: Medium: 82 linesby CNB