Wright: The Speaker Has His Policies

An oppressively hot summer brought strange twists to the Capitol. While President Reagan and his Democratic critics stubbornly refused to confront the massive federal budget deficit, the stock market whooshed to record highs and reports from economic forecasters grew brighter. A Marine Corps officer testified about having taken over the nation’s Middle East policy and members of both parties barely challenged his actions. More recent policy news added to the unpredictable climate:

House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Tex.) has become de facto , a temporary secretary of state for Central America. In hammering out a plan with President Reagan’s endorsement--for a Nicaragua cease-fire between the Sandinistas and the contras , including a pledge for peace talks--Wright brought a new turn to the stalemate of U.S. policy in that region.

Wright also managed a neat political trick. He alarmed liberal Democrats who feared that he was playing into Reagan’s hands on added military support for the contra rebels; Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) first called the ploy “a sham from beginning to end.” And Wright angered Republican stalwarts who thought their lame-duck chief might be selling out their cause. “We had the Democrats beat on contra aid and Jim Wright took the issue back,” moaned a House GOP leader. “He’s a brilliant politician.”

Both sets of critics may be correct. Yet the best evidence of the ship of state having no rudder may be that Wright initially got both sides to suspend disbelief.

Who is Wright and how did he orchestrate what could be an international and domestic political coup?

The new Speaker, who has not made a notable public mark since he took over his post from Thomas P. O’Neill Jr. (D-Mass.) in January, fancies himself a foreign relations expert but he has little diplomatic experience. What the former Golden Gloves boxing champion has shown during 33 years in the House is a stubborn and often cerebral independence. Wright suffers as an impetuous loner, critics long have claimed, but even they concede that he is a quick study of issues and politics.

The contrast to his predecessor is striking. Although both Democratic leaders consistently opposed contra aid, Wright’s Texas roots make him more sensitive to the domestic political problems posed by the Sandinista government in Managua. O’Neill would not have struck a deal with the President; his leadership style was to watch the consensus build in his party, not to innovate. Where O’Neill was the friendly priest who usually sought the views of his parishioners before acting, Wright is the archbishop who publicly announces doctrine and then listens while his minions tremble and try to explain why it cannot be attained.

Wright, for example, has repeatedly called this year for a tax increase, despite stern opposition from House Ways and Means Committee chairman Dan Rostenkowski (D-Ill.) and many other politically worried Democrats.

“We don’t want to continue indulging ourselves to each of our fantasies and putting it all on a credit card and sending it to the grandchildren,” he told an interviewer. “That, to me, is not honest. I’d rather pay as we go. I’d rather pay taxes.”

Compared to the unpopularity of hiking taxes, an attempt to restore order in Nicaragua and neighboring countries seems almost simple. For Wright, the process began in a late July meeting with Thomas G. Loeffler, a former House Republican from Texas; Reagan recently named Loeffler as coordinator of White House efforts to win renewed congressional funds for the contras .

While many GOP conservatives had grown euphoric over Lt. Col. Oliver L. North’s congressional testimony, figuring it had turned the odds their way on the prospect for renewed aid this fall, Loeffler’s head count showed otherwise. For months, Wright had been telling Reagan and his top advisers the same thing, that House support for the contras had slipped since last year’s 221-209 vote of $100 million in military aid, and that the White House should seek a negotiated settlement with the Sandinistas.

When Loeffler then indicated the Administration’s interest in a diplomatic route, including a recognition of Nicaraguan sovereignty, Wright leaped at the opportunity. The Speaker had been in private contact with Central American leaders and thought the time was right for a broad approach. And despite his recent partisan volleys with Reagan, Wright has often praised the exemplary bipartisan cooperation of 1950s, between President Dwight D. Eisenhower and another Speaker from Texas, Sam Rayburn.

Wright rejected the deep skepticism immediately voiced by many senior Democrats about Reagan’s motives and suggested a 60-day cease-fire in Nicaragua simultaneous with a restoration of civil liberties and cutoff of further U.S. aid for the contras . To minimize the partisan risk, Wright insisted that Reagan suspend his public appeals to back the rebels. Following a two-week series of intensive meetings in Congress and at the White House--where Secretary of State George P. Shultz and National Security Adviser Frank C. Carlucci reportedly voiced reservations--Reagan unveiled the plan on Aug. 5. Then, only days later, Reagan seemed to join Wright in agreeing, at least temporarily, to see whether another plan, drafted by five Central American leaders and including concessions to the Sandinistas, might sooner advance a cease-fire.

Many questions still remain: Why has Reagan made what looks like a 180-degree switch? (Some insiders speculate that Nancy Reagan wants a “peacemaker” role for her husband.) Can the cease-fire be extended while talks continue? Is the Soviet Union barred from further arms shipments to Nicaragua? And, if plans bog down, how would Congress handle a contra aid request from Reagan?

Whatever, Wright’s bold step solidified his position as the preeminent Democrat in Congress. House predominance has characterized most of the first seven months in this year’s legislative session, the first since 1980 with a Democratic-controlled Senate. While the House has passed catastrophic health-care benefits for Medicare recipients and arms-control limitations on Reagan, those measures and others have been stymied in the Senate, partly by Republican filibusters.

Although Wright wants to enact much of this legislation, he says that an important task for Democrats is to define an agenda for campaign use by their presidential nominee next year.

Wright has had his own problems, including several news stories alleging financial irregularities by him and his Texas-based business partners, which he has denied. And slow action on next year’s federal budget has set the stage for a September “train wreck” between Congress and Reagan, a potential managerial nightmare.

On balance, however, Jim Wright felt upbeat as he began the August recess by vacationing this week with friends in California. It has been a long time since a Democrat has called the shots on a major issue in Washington.