Charge Rights Aide Misled Panel : GOP, Democrats Assail Justice Dept. Nominee

Both Senate Republicans and Democrats on Tuesday sharply criticized William Bradford Reynolds, President Reagan’s controversial nominee for the No. 3 post in the Justice Department, charging that he misled them about his past conduct as the Administration’s top civil rights lawyer.

Pleading a faulty memory, Reynolds admitted at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing that, contrary to testimony he gave the panel two weeks ago, he had not consulted with several civil rights lawyers in Louisiana before deciding against providing federal assistance in voting rights lawsuits they were filing against that state in 1983.

Confusion over Reynolds’ responses to questions on the Louisiana incident and other actions led the Republican-controlled committee to take the unusual step of reopening the confirmation hearings. At the close of the initial round of questioning, Reynolds was considered a cinch to win Senate approval to become associate attorney general, even by opponents who contend that he has used his position to stifle, rather than further, progress on civil rights cases.

Enforcement Questioned

At Tuesday’s hearing Reynolds’ conduct was examined closely by two Republicans, Sens. Charles McC. Mathias Jr. of Maryland and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania. They complained that the nominee, while heading the Justice Department’s civil rights division, repeatedly had failed to enforce laws and court orders with which he disagreed.

“I see a pattern of elevating your own legal judgment over the judgments of the courts (and) disregarding the stated law as you move through the civil rights field,” Specter told Reynolds.

Arizona Sen. Dennis DeConcini, a conservative Democrat who frequently sides with Administration views, also complained of “out-and-out bold distortions and untruths” in Reynolds’ previous committee testimony. Although he has publicly declined to say whether he will vote to confirm Reynolds, DeConcini reportedly has asked Reagan to withdraw the nomination.

DeConcini also was irked by a national radio speech Reagan made Saturday in which the President claimed that Reynolds’ confirmation problems resulted from his opposition to mandatory busing and hiring quotas.

‘Deeply Disappointed’

“I’m deeply disappointed in the President of the United States, based on his statement of last Saturday that this is an issue of busing and quotas,” DeConcini told Reynolds. “It is an issue of whether you told the truth.”

Reynolds acknowledged that his previous testimony on some matters might have been misunderstood by the senators. At one point he apologized for mistakenly saying that his department did not file a brief in a 1982 Georgia civil rights case because of a budget crunch, admitting that he did not agree with the position taken by black plaintiffs in the case.

But Reynolds insisted that he did not intentionally mislead the committee when he first testified before it. “I did in fact testify truthfully, honestly and straightforwardly,” he said.

Despite criticism from some committee Republicans, Reynolds’ conduct as civil rights chief won strong backing from other GOP members. Sen. Jeremiah Denton (R-Ala.) complained that Reynolds’ nomination was being subjected to a “civil rights litmus test” and claimed opponents were taking out on Reynolds frustrations over a national trend away from so-called “reverse discrimination” to correct civil rights abuses.

“I don’t see making this man the goat for those trends,” Denton said.