‘Not a Potted Plant’ President--Reagan : Tells Wisconsin Towns He’ll Fight Over Economics

President Reagan, hawking his “Economic Bill of Rights” in three towns near Milwaukee today, rejected the notion of a “potted-plant presidency” and promised he would vigorously pursue his policies through the rest of his term.

The President, taking another of his carefully orchestrated trips outside Washington while the Iran- contra hearings progress, also told a Rotary Club luncheon in West Bend that he would send any bills with tax increases on a “one-way cruise to Nowhere on the SS Veto.”

“Looking at the way Washington spends money, you would think you were watching ‘Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous,’ ” Reagan said.

Republican Areas

The President also took his economic crusade--for a balanced budget amendment, the line-item veto and less taxation--to workers at Broan Manufacturing, a leading maker of home ventilation products in Hartford, Wis., and to a Port Washington rally on the shores of Lake Michigan. All three towns are relatively prosperous and predominantly Republican.

At Broan, in an allusion to the foreign policy scandal, Reagan again struck back at those who have written him off as a lame duck.

“There is much to do in the next 18 months,” he said. “And to borrow a phrase, which you might have heard recently from one of the lawyers--defense lawyers--at the legislative hearings going on in Washington who had to protest that he wasn’t a potted plant as a lawyer there with his client, I reject a potted-plant presidency.”

Not a Plant

The phrase “potted-plant presidency” was a takeoff on an outburst from attorney Brendan V. Sullivan Jr. before the Iran-contra committees during questioning earlier this month of his client, Lt. Col. Oliver L. North. Sullivan complained, “I am not a potted plant” when panel leaders overruled his objections.

Businesses and homes along the main streets in each town were festooned with welcome banners, balloons and American flags. Vendors sold Reagan T-shirts.

At all three stops, Reagan bragged that his Administration slowed inflation, boosted employment, pared big government and cut taxes.

“We’ve done our best to keep the federal government’s grasping hand out of your pockets,” he said, but warned that Congress is threatening to undo economic gains with runaway spending.

They Can’t Resist

“When it comes to spending your tax dollars, Congress, like Oscar Wilde, can resist everything but temptation,” he told cheering Broan workers.

He cited as particularly wasteful mass-transit subsidies, $400 million in loan payments for offshore oil rigs, farm aid that he said goes mostly to wealthy farmers and the trade bill passed by the Senate last week.

The bill “invites foreign retaliation and a trade war that would threaten every one of the up to 10 million American jobs that are tied to trade,” he said.