President Holds ‘Raucous’ Meeting With Balky GOP : He Tries to Salvage Tax Reform Bill

President Reagan, relying on his noted personal powers of persuasion, held what was termed a “raucous” meeting with House Republicans on Capitol Hill today to try to rescue his dying goal of rewriting the nation’s tax code after a morning of lobbying from aboard Air Force One.

Some House members said Reagan may have done enough persuading to win support for a tax revision plan, but others called the measure “the wrong bill.”

“I think he clearly has enough votes from Republicans” to have the bill brought to a vote, said Rep. Jim Leach (R-Iowa). However, he added it is “conjecture” whether Reagan has enough votes for the tax bill to pass.

Rep. Arlin Strangeland (R-Minn.) called the meeting with Reagan “raucous” and said he was unsure whether anyone’s mind was changed.

“I don’t even know the names of the 14 (who voted for it) and I’m one of them,” he said.

After returning from a memorial service in Kentucky for American servicemen killed in last Thursday’s plane crash, Reagan made the trip to a House office building to try to personally pressure GOP lawmakers to change their opposition to the bill.

Vice President George Bush also attended the session.

Earlier, on his trip to and from Kentucky, Reagan telephoned some of the lawmakers from Air Force One and lobbied for the legislation.

‘We Are Hopeful’

White House Chief of Staff Donald T. Regan said, “We are hopeful” Reagan will successfully round up enough House GOP votes to win passage of the Democratic tax plan, which was blocked last week when all but 14 of the 182 Republicans ignored Reagan and voted against considering the measure.

Said Regan: “We’re still working on it. It’s slow, but we’re coming along.”

The President faced a formidable task: persuading about one-third of the 182 GOP members to hold their noses and vote for a Democratic version of the tax bill, just to keep it alive for the Republican-run Senate to work on next year.

In advance of Reagan’s closed-door session with fellow Republicans, House Speaker Thomas P. (Tip) O’Neill Jr. (D-Mass.) called it “the most important meeting of his second term.”

Stressing that 50 to 75 GOP votes for the committee bill are essential, O’Neill noted, “I cannot believe that a President who won the votes of 54 million Americans cannot gain the support of his own Republican caucus for his No. 1 second-term initiative.

Wants Reassurance

“If the President informs me personally that he has a list of the necessary votes for passage of the bill, we will begin moving ahead with the bipartisan reform process,” O’Neill added.

Last week’s defeat was an setback for the President, when the House refused even to consider the bill. Reagan is pitted against almost the entire Republican leadership, which views the bill as worse than the present system on grounds it would hurt the economy by discouraging business investment.