WASHINGTON -- A dramatic overhaul of the welfare system, shaped in the House by the Republican "Contract with America," is likely to undergo some retooling in the Senate -- but many of the fundamental changes that have sparked an acrimonious national debate may well be retained.
"I think, by and large, this bill's going to be passed intact," House Majority Leader Dick Armey, a Texas Republican, predicted in a television interview yesterday. "I would say the essential spirit of the bill will be in the final package as we see it now."
While critics of the House bill hope that Senate GOP moderates and Democrats will block approval of such a sweeping measure, the political momentum is on the side of major revisions in the decades-old system.
No one in either party is arguing on behalf of the status quo.
Senate action is still months away. But like the House, which passed its version of the welfare measure Friday, the GOP-controlled Senate is expected to sharply restrict welfare benefits, limit the time a recipient may stay on the rolls and turn most assistance programs over to the states. Federal funding would continue, though at a reduced rate.
In addition, a requirement that recipients take jobs to continue receiving benefits may be even tighter than that prescribed by the House.
However, help for working mothers -- such as child care and health benefits -- may be more generous than in the House measure, in part to show "conservatism with a compassionate face," said Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, a Utah Republican.
Less clear is whether the Senate will join the House in scrapping the concept of an automatic entitlement to cash benefits for all who meet the eligibility standards -- a safety net for the poor that dates back to the 1930s.
"My guess is some of what we do on welfare reform will be weaker than the House, but some may be stronger," said Senate Majority Whip Trent Lott of Mississippi. "I just hope we don't wimp out."
The legislation, which is not expected to reach the Senate floor until midsummer at the earliest, is being driven by a bipartisan consensus in favor of redesigning welfare, combined with the desire for budget savings and political jockeying in the presidential sweepstakes.
There is some chance that the welfare legislation, which Finance Committee Chairman Bob Packwood, an Oregon Republican, predicted would be the "most contentious" issue facing the Senate this year, might unravel as it makes its way through the legislative process.
Senate Democrats are sure to resist what they describe as needlessly harsh elements of the Republican welfare bill -- such as denial of benefits to unwed teen-age mothers and elimination of job training programs.
Democrats to resist
Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski of Maryland said she and her fellow Democrats plan to offer their own proposal and, if necessary, use the threat of a filibuster to make sure their views are taken seriously.
What's more, Mr. Clinton holds veto power over the measure that would almost certainly kill it. It's unlikely that the Republicans could get the two-thirds vote necessary to override a veto if the issue breaks down along partisan lines.
Yet, Mr. Clinton and his party are clearly unwilling to draw firm lines in the sand at this point.
"We want a bill that is tough on work and that is fair to children," said White House chief of staff Leon E. Panetta, who appeared after Mr. Armey on NBC's "Meet the Press."
"The bill that passed, frankly, on the House side is weak on work requirements and very tough on children. We want to basically reverse those priorities."
Mr. Clinton, who promised during his 1992 campaign to "end welfare as we know it," wants to avoid what one prospective Republican challenger says will be an attempt to embarrass the president on the issue.
"We're going to pass the toughest bill we can, then leave it up to him to decide whether or not he's going to go along with the wishes of the American people," said Sen. Phil Gramm, a Texas Republican and a candidate for the 1996 GOP presidential nomination.
Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole of Kansas, another GOP presidential contender, has backed off his January pronouncements that key elements of the House bill -- barring benefits for legal aliens and single mothers under 18 -- are "not going to happen."
Mr. Dole now says that he and his GOP colleagues are inclined to leave such matters to the discretion of governors, who are "closer to the people."
"I would be astonished if the Senate failed to produce a welfare reform bill this year that is very conservative and very tough," said Robert Greenstein, executive director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, an advocacy group for the poor.
"I expect the Senate version to be more moderate, but only in comparison to the House bill, which I consider really extreme."
The House measure
The welfare measure passed Friday by the House is the keystone of the social policy changes that House Republicans promised would be brought to the floor for action in the first 100 days of this congressional term, which began Jan. 4.
But the House bill also represents the culmination of years of effort by Republicans and conservative Democrats to dismantle a program that they contend traps recipients in a cycle of dependency destructive both to them and society in general.
Under the House bill, the practice of automatic cash payments to all who are eligible would end. Most welfare recipients would be required to work after two years and would lose benefits after five years.
In addition, unwed parents under 18 would not be eligible for cash payments, and higher benefits would be denied for children conceived and born while the mother is on welfare. Legal immigrants would simply be dropped from the rolls.
The House bill would save $66 billion over five years by meshing 45 federal welfare programs into four grants that would go to the states with few, if any, strings attached.
Federal funds would be frozen at their current level or allowed to grow more slowly than than if they continued to increase automatically.
"I think the Senate is going to pass something very similar," said freshman Sen. Rick Santorum, a Pennsylvania Republican who was a leading advocate of welfare reform last year as a House member.
"A lot of senators really haven't focused on it yet, but more and more are telling me what the House is doing really makes sense."
The Republicans would like to attach the welfare proposals to a broader bill that the Democrats can't filibuster, Mr. Lott said. But Ms. Mikulski said her colleagues would use parliamentary devices to prevent that.
Clearly, the Senate version will be packaged differently than in the House, where the $66 billion in savings were earmarked to partially offset a $189 billion package of tax cuts that will be considered by the House later this month.
The connection with the tax legislation made it easy for Democrats to charge that Republicans were reducing funds for school lunches, food stamps and nutrition for pregnant women and infant children to give tax breaks to businesses and to families with incomes up to $200,000.
"I don't think the House Republicans got anything out of this in terms of the issue," said Bruce Reed, a domestic policy adviser to Mr. Clinton. "They just looked mean, and angered the Catholic church," which feared that denying benefits to young, unwed mothers would encourage abortion.
But there seems no doubt the Senate welfare reform effort will move forward on several fronts.
The House decision to sharply curtail Social Security disability payments -- by denying benefits to alcoholics, drug addicts and children with behavior problems -- is likely to be affirmed in the Senate, said Alan K. Simpson, a Wyoming Republican who chairs a Finance subcommittee in charge of that issue.
Republican Sen. Nancy Landon Kassebaum of Kansas, chairman the Committee on Labor and Human Resources, said she will bring to the Senate floor next month a proposal to combine scores of federal job training programs into a few block grants as the House has done.
Budget savings
The Senate, like the House, is determined to come up with enough budget savings to wipe out the federal deficit by 2002. That means the senators need to find up to $1.2 trillion in savings over seven years.
To fulfill that goal, the Senate Agriculture Committee was directed by the GOP leadership last week to come up with $35 billion to $50 billion in cuts over five years.
The largest pot the committee has to draw from is the school lunch program, which the House proposed to cut nearly $20 billion over five years.
Another hint of the financial pressure came from a Senate Republican task force directed by Mr. Dole to find places to save money.
That group recently recommended taking even more from welfare programs than the House did: $89 billion over five years, compared with $66 billion.