Lithuania Finds Independence Is Not Easy--Exhilaration Gives Way to Weariness : Secession: History has been made but the details remain. ‘My emotions are tired,’ says one lawmaker.

In the Lithuanian parliamentary hall, the lights go on early and stay on late. But the television cameras from around the world have disappeared, and only a few observers stop in now and then to watch the proceedings.

Exhilaration has given away to weariness as deputies who just days ago made history now immerse themselves in detailed, grueling debates over how to implement their landmark declaration of independence and make things work on their own after half a century of depending on Moscow.

“I am tired. I am a man in good condition, but it is my emotions that are tired,” said Bronius Kuzmickas, a deputy and one of the five members of the legislature’s Supreme Council.

The republic’s unprecedented declaration of sovereignty, approved unanimously and with a minimum of debate Sunday night, was only “the beginning of the end” of Soviet domination, said Kuzmickas. “Now we must realize our work step by step.”

Lithuania’s declaration rejected Soviet rule, which was forcibly instituted here and in the other Baltic republics of Latvia and Estonia in 1940 under a secret pact between Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin.

President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, however, has refused to recognize the republic’s actions and said he will not negotiate with Lithuanians about independence.

Lawmakers in this capital city are optimistic that he will change his mind, so they are working at least 10 hours a day in the parliamentary hall that only last week was decorated with the Soviet hammer and sickle. Now it is adorned with the Lithuanian flag and a copper plaque showing the territory’s coat of arms--a triumphant knight.

Many deputies say they are too overwhelmed by work these days to feel triumphant. Most of their attention is focused on economic matters, which leaders say will be the key to whether this territory of 3.5 million people can translate words of independence into meaning in daily life.

While Lithuania produces little that is essential to the Soviet Union, they say, the Soviet Union possesses much that Lithuanians cannot live without.

“Our future is of an independent country, of course, but we must remain as brothers with the Soviet Union,” said Kuzmickas. “It is of crucial importance because the Soviet Union is much bigger than we are.”

On the plus side, Lithuania produces 90% of its own meat and butter needs and 80% of its clothing requirements. It also holds a virtual monopoly in the Soviet Union on the production of some electronic goods, such as radios, as well as refrigerators, certain electric tools, metal polishing devices and some components for televisions.

But, to supply its 200 factories, employing hundreds of thousands of people, the territory imports more than 88% of its raw materials from the Soviet Union, economists say.

Only about 30% of its finished goods remain in Lithuania under the economic plan imposed by Moscow. The rest is shipped, either elsewhere in the Soviet Union or abroad, and Lithuania has promised to honor those contracts for now.

Lithuania also will have to cope with what presumably will be the eventual loss of state subsidies on everything from food to housing to energy costs.

The very deputies trying to implement independence, for instance, eat lunch in the state-subsidized parliamentary cafeteria. Once a dining room for the Communist elite, a three-course meal there still costs only 35 to 45 kopecks--60 to 75 cents at the official exchange rate.

The territory’s economists hope to spur foreign investment by offering prospective investors an exchange rate of about six rubles to the dollar--10 times better than the rate offered to foreign companies dealing with the Soviet Union.

But for now, the picture is grim. There are only 15 joint ventures operating in Lithuania--none with Western capital investment of more than $1 million.

Lithuanian leaders hope to raise funds by selling off state-owned enterprises to private investors. They want, too, to redirect to the Lithuanian government taxes now sent to Moscow, and they plan to approach international lenders, such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, for financial assistance.

Once they have a fairly stable economic system in place, have built up their hard currency reserves and have won public confidence in the government, economists say they hope to replace the Soviet ruble with the former Lithuanian currency, known as the litas.

Prime Minister Kazimira-Danute Prunskiene, herself one of the republic’s leading economists, has spoken to companies in both West Germany and the United States about printing the currency.

But first, said lawmaker and economist Kazimerias Antanevicuis, “We have a lot of work to do. Our whole economic system should be changed, and the legal system, too. It would be amazing if we could finish all this work” by the end of the year.

With an eye to eventual negotiations with Moscow, the lawmakers have set up a committee to prepare Lithuania’s negotiating stance on issues such as common property, trade treaties, seashore and fishing rights, airspace control and border regulations.

They are also preparing to bill Moscow for about 1.5 tons of Lithuanian gold confiscated by the Soviet Union, as well as what they say are decades of economic mismanagement and reparations for those Lithuanians deported, killed or jailed under Soviet rule.

The bill is being prepared in response to Gorbachev’s statement that Lithuania will owe about $34 billion to Moscow for investment in infrastructure and factories built by the Soviet Union.

The deputies are working on other plans to make their new country function on a day-to-day basis according to their own design.

Moscow set up a cumbersome and top-heavy system of government ministries in Vilnius, and the deputies want to streamline the bureaucracy through cuts and consolidation, eliminating at least half.

Then there is the sticky issue of the 30,000 Soviet troops on Lithuanian soil and the 50,000 Lithuanians serving in the Red Army. Legislators have set up a committee to study the possibility of obtaining immunity for Lithuanians who began deserting their army units soon after Sunday’s independence declaration.

Another committee is studying how to effect the departure of Soviet troops from Lithuanian soil. As a step toward that goal, the legislature passed a resolution this week calling for the closure of all army draft and recruiting offices in Lithuania.

There were signs, however, that the Soviet troops would not comply. The Soviet military handed over a statement to the Lithuanian Supreme Council on Wednesday saying it does not recognize the declaration of independence and will act only in accordance with Soviet laws.

“The final purpose, of course, is to get the status of a neutral state and therefore to have no foreign troops or military bases in Lithuania,” said Edvardas Vilkas, head of the committee and also a member of the Supreme Council. “Of course, this is not so easy, and I think in reality there will be Soviet bases here for several years at least.”

Sunday’s declaration of independence was “after all, just a declaration. Real freedom, real independence, we don’t have yet,” said Antanas Terleckas, a former dissident and now chairman of the Lithuanian Freedom League. “It is going to be a long, hard road ahead.”

Times staff writer Hamilton reported from Moscow and Schrader from Vilnius.