Outside Fees Bring Quayle Much More Than Bentsen

Vice presidential candidates Lloyd Bentsen and Dan Quayle are in sharp contrast when it comes to two of the more valuable Senate fringe benefits--speaking fees and free trips.

In the last six years, Quayle (R-Ind.) reported honorariums earnings of $250,050 from speech-making and another $4,830 from writing articles.

Bentsen (D-Tex.) got nothing from outside speaking and writing, according to the required financial disclosure statements covering 1982 through 1987. The chairman of the tax-writing Finance Committee, Bentsen is one of a handful of senators who decline to take honorariums.

Quayle’s receipts put him in the mainstream of the Senate, where most members routinely get $1,000 to $2,000 a speech from trade associations, corporations, nonprofit groups, think tanks and universities.

The only restriction in the Senate on such outside income applies if a member’s speech and writing fees total more than 40% of the official salary--$89,500. The excess must be given to a bona fide charity.

Quayle’s 1982-1987 disclosure forms also show that he was far ahead of Bentsen in accepting free trips--air fare, lodging and sometimes meals--often in connection with a paid speech.

The Indianian reported 44 expense-paid excursions. In the same six years, Bentsen took four free trips.

The two rivals showed parity in one fringe-benefit area, gifts.

Bentsen listed two gifts, each a Steuben glass sculpture, with a combined value of $2,750. Quayle’s $2,436 in gifts were in the form of golf equipment and clothing.

Quayle’s top honorariums year was 1983, when he got $54,150 for 50 speeches and $1,500 for an article for the Institute for Socioeconometric Studies. There was no limit then on how much a senator could keep.

Quayle gave $1,250 of his 1983 speaking fees to charity.

In 1986, with the 40% limit, he gave $19,991 to charity after earning $49,400 from 37 speeches and $585 from three articles. Last year, he got $46,900 from 35 speeches and $2,355 from nine articles and gave $14,302 to charity.

During the six years, Quayle spoke most often to the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. His 21 appearances there brought him $6,600.

Quayle was popular with the Grocery Manufacturers of America, making a speech to the trade association in 1982 for $1,000 and in 1984, 1986 and 1987 for $2,000 each of those years.

He also received pay for speaking to defense contractors, drug companies and health-care associations. He is a member of the Armed Services and Labor and Human Services committees, which handle defense and health-care issues.

His peak travel year was 1983 with 15 trips, including three nights in Orlando, Fla.--and a $2,000 honorarium--from the American Medical Assn. Other free destinations included Miami with Magnavox Electronic Systems Inc., and West Palm Beach, Fla., with Chase Manhattan Bank.

Each of Bentsen’s four trips was reported as a one-day excursion. In 1985, the West Central Texas Oil and Gas Assn. took him to Abilene. The following year, he went to Modesto, Calif., with the National Venture Capital Assn.; to Houston with the Forum Club of Houston, and to Dallas with the National Assn. of Home Builders.