WASHINGTON -- In the past, President Clinton and House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt have not always been singing from the same political page, but in the House impeachment struggle, the Democratic leader emerged as the president's most eloquent congressional defender.

Mr. Clinton's worst hour was Mr. Gephardt's finest.

Mr. Gephardt appealed for reconciliation across partisan barriers and an end to "the politics of slash and burn."

First Lady Hillary Clinton and many other Democrats made similar pleas, but Mr. Gephardt said it better than anyone else, with passion, force and spontaneity rarely seen on the House floor.

The fact that the Republicans did not listen did not take away from the historic importance and potential impact of what the Missouri Democrat said. If a narrowly divided Congress cannot recapture a sense of civility and accommodation, it cannot adequately function at all.

Vice President Al Gore pointedly commended Mr. Gephardt later at the White House. Mr. Gore called Mr. Gephardt's emotional remarks "the finest speech" he had heard in Congress since they both arrived in the House two decades ago.

Mr. Gephardt, a possible presidential candidate in 2000, tore up his prepared speech after Speaker-elect Bob Livingston's stunning resignation to reach rhetorically across the aisle and ask Mr. Livingston to reconsider his decision. He called Mr. Livingston a "good and honorable man," the kind of cross-party praise for a political foe seldom heard in the House these days.

When Mr. Gephardt finished, he was rewarded with an unusual, prolonged standing ovation from Democratic members. At that moment, Mr. Gephardt proved he has the stuff to be speaker if the Democrats recapture the House.

The Republican members, unmoved and sullen, sat on their hands in a sad demonstration of their unwillingness to give a partisan inch even when a suffering colleague is praised.

Mr. Gephardt's gesture was an empty one that came too late, as he knew it would. But it was a symbolic way to begin retreating from what he calls the partisan "abyss" created by the intolerance and vicious self-righteousness that dominates the House and threatens to consume our political system and our country.

Mr. Livingston himself had contributed to Washington's downward partisan spiral by refusing to allow the House to consider a bipartisan censure resolution as an alternative to impeachment. It confirmed the Republican House majority's real goal, which was not to punish the president but to drive him from office. (The GOP congressional leaders invented some legalistic poppycock, but their refusal of a censure vote had more to do with the fact that it might get GOP votes and pass than any credible constitutional basis.)

Mr. Gephardt could have crowed about the political demise of the second GOP speaker in two months, ironically brought down just like Mr. Clinton by illicit sex. It means the Democrats can't be tabbed the sole party of immorality after all.

When Mr. Livingston confessed to having had affairs, Republicans tried unsuccessfully to pull the old double standard. They said it didn't compare with Mr. Clinton's behavior because Mr. Livingston had never been asked about sex and therefore never lied except during his marriage vow. They said Mr. Livingston's acts were private, whereas Mr. Clinton's involved public lying under oath. The difference came down to which man had been asked about sex and which one hadn't. It didn't fly.

In addition, Mr. Gephardt could have warned ominously that the Republicans would pay a price at the ballot box for unilaterally doing in Mr. Clinton, extending the cycle of political retaliation into eternity.

The recent game of mutual revenge now stands at one GOP and one Democratic president, one Democratic and one GOP speaker, one GOP speaker-elect, several Cabinet officers and Cabinet nominees of both parties and a GOP Supreme Court nominee.

Rep. Charles Schumer, the New York Democratic senator-elect, observed sadly that "what began 25 years ago with Watergate . . . has grown beyond our control so that now we are routinely using criminal accusations and scandal to win the political battles and ideological differences we cannot settle at the ballot box. It has been used with reckless abandon by both parties. . . . My fear is that when a Republican wins the White House, Democrats will demand payback."

To judge by the polls, the country agrees with Mr. Gephardt that the personal rancor and perpetual distrust in Washington have gone too far. A series of national polls all say roughly the same thing: A two-thirds majority of those surveyed don't want him to be forced out of office or to resign.

By contrast, slightly fewer than one-third of the voters surveyed have a favorable view of the Republican Party. Two thirds disapprove of the House decision to impeach Mr. Clinton.

But there is no easy way to get from today's mean-spirited climate to Mr. Gephardt's "new politics of respect and fairness and decency." One side has to start, and the other side to respond.

Marianne Means is a syndicated columnist.

Pub Date: 12/23/98