GOP: 35 Frustrating Years of House-Hunting : Congress: Republicans look for new ways to control Congress. Leaders split on whether national or local strategy wins House seats.

Imagine the pain for House Republicans. For 18 consecutive elections, since 1955, they have failed to win a majority of House seats and the accompanying control of chairmanships. As they remain frustrated, who could blame them for contemplating an East European-style purge of the Democrats atop congressional leadership ranks?

They have already tried almost everything else. Now House GOP leaders prepare their version of “Back to the Future,” Chapter 19. In recent, sometimes-rancorous meetings at the Capitol, they recited the familiar arguments and decided, in effect, to return to square one. Their unmet goals offer a useful epitaph for the politics of the 1980s.

Three GOP presidential landslides during the past decade have left Republicans with only 176 House seats--a net gain of 17 since 1980, but far short of the 218 needed for control. Democrats’ ability to hold House seats has been a major factor in Washington’s continuing political gridlock. During those years, even Senate Republicans could bask, from 1981-87, in the majority limelight. But the 1980 Reagan landslide could not furnish long enough coattails to carry GOP House challengers.

House Republicans have had plenty of ideas to overcome the Democrats’ incumbency advantage. Their 1982 national slogan--”Stay the Course”--was doomed when, in the depths of a recession, unemployment topped 10%. Two years later, President Reagan’s “Morning in America” theme gave few voters much reason to toss out Democratic congressmen. In 1988, as in 1984, many Democrats successfully distanced themselves from dead weight at the top of their ticket.

At the center of GOP debate has been a long-running conflict over strategy. The wing affiliated with Jack F. Kemp, the early leader of the supply-siders, has advocated a scorched-earth practice of identifying a set of national issues and emphasizing the differences between the two parties. Republicans executed this approach with great success in 1980.

The more conventional each-to-his-own style, which most incumbents in both parties find more comfortable, focuses on a local candidate’s ability to define issues and back-home political appeal. Former-House Speaker Thomas P. O’Neill (D-Mass.) was a leading exponent of this “all politics is local” view.

In the mid-1980s, some conservative and relatively junior House Republicans, unhappy about Reagan’s reluctance to draw party lines, moved to define what they called the “Conservative Opportunity Society.” They rallied behind fierce partisanship to develop new ideas showing that right-wing ideology can positively address problems facing the nation. Their leader was a little-known Georgia firebrand, Newt Gingrich.

Even then, however, other Republicans dismissed this as wrong-headed because too few voters cast a party-line ballot. “I signed up to be a conservative Republican, not a lemming,” Rep. Mickey Edwards (R-Okla.) said at the time.

Their recent internal review of how to win House majority in the 1990s was led by Minority Leader Robert H. Michel (R-Ill.). Some things were new: Gingrich and Edwards have each gained key spots in the House GOP bureaucracy. George Bush is President. And Jim Wright (D-Texas) has been forced out as House speaker--due, partly, to persistent efforts by Gingrich. But the dispute appears to ave undergone little overall change.

Edwards cites modest public reaction to the Wright ethics-scandal as proof of his contention. He argues that issues such as the Wright case and Gingrich’s focus on other corrupt Democrats are unimportant to most voters when they vote on their next representative in Congress. “We tried the grand idea of a silver bullet but we got our brains beat out,” Edwards said. “We can’t continue to push the national themes or we’ll be a permanent minority.” Evidence for Edward’s case came from recent public-opinion focus groups organized by Democratic pollsters Stan Greenberg and Celinda Lake; they asked voters for reaction to the name Jim Wright. Result: “Most participants went blank.”

For his part, Gingrich downplays differences with Edwards but continues to defend an approach he claims has not been fully tested: “To win a majority, we need a general national tide which must be translated in individual districts.” Republicans failed to develop such a tide in 1988, he said, because they had to devote resources to rescuing Bush’s late-starting campaign. Now he wants what he calls a “compassionate” reform agenda in areas such as drugs, health and economic policy.

The Gingrich-Edwards clash is important because both men are likely contenders when Michel retires as GOP leader, perhaps as early as 1992. A third potential candidate comes from California, Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands), House GOP Conference chairman. He sides with the Edwards view that elections are won in each district, but Lewis has spent time developing a 1990 national legislative agenda for House Republicans to show how they differ from Democrats.

“The national backdrop should have a theme,” Lewis said. “But unless we have done key things in each state, we are spinning our wheels.” In California, Lewis said, that means next year’s top priority for House Republicans will be electing Sen. Pete Wilson as governor. Otherwise, the GOP faces the grim prospect of being shut out of the vital redistricting process in Sacramento, where the lines for the current 45 House districts--plus an additional six or seven--will be drawn in 1991.

National Republican divisions reflect larger splits within the party. The architects of Reagan’s second landslide and Bush’s victory devoted little attention to contests at the bottom of the ticket. Nor have they embraced Gingrich’s suggestions: a frontal attack on Democrats and their policies, along with a set of constructive alternatives. Bush’s pallid first-year agenda hardly gave politicians and voters much incentive to mount the barricades.

House Republicans lately have suggested that 1990 will be different. They agreed in early December meetings to draw clearer distinctions between the two parties’ philosophies. They expect, for example, to work with Bush on a more complete legislative agenda, focusing on such issues as housing for the poor, crime-control, savings incentives and educational excellence. These issues, leaders hope, will create unity on their side and leave Democrats divided.

One puzzle is how House Speaker Thomas S. Foley may adapt his distinctly nonpartisan style to increased GOP confrontation. The tumultuous international shifts have so far produced little partisan friction beyond battles over Bush cozying up to the Chinese.

Even if partisan conflict heats up, the odds favor relatively modest changes in House and Senate seats following November’s election. The big stakes will be in 1992, after nationwide redistricting for the House. The prospect of several vulnerable Democratic senators could also mean major changes in power for each body--especially if Bush holds and flexes his political muscle. Republicans know that their failure to score big that year could be their last major chance in Congress for many years.