Atty. Gen. Thornburgh to Leave Cabinet, Run for Senate : Politics: He will seek Pennsylvania seat once held by late Sen. John Heinz. Bush has not named his choice to lead the Justice Department.

Atty. Gen. Dick Thornburgh, who in a quarter-century of political life has seldom concealed his disdain for legislatures, has decided to run for one, announcing Tuesday that he will resign his Cabinet post to seek a U.S. Senate seat from Pennsylvania.

“We are going to miss his wisdom and his support,” President Bush said during a Cabinet meeting at which the decision was revealed. Bush added that “at my request,” Thornburgh will stay on through July to work on the Administration’s crime and civil rights bills and on final regulations to implement a new federal law banning discrimination against handicapped people.

Thornburgh’s announcement came after weeks of indecision as he balanced pressure from Pennsylvania Republicans to run for the Senate seat against his reluctance to give up the attorney general’s post, which friends say he has deeply enjoyed.

Republican strategists are nursing hopes of winning back control of the Senate in 1992, a goal that would be sharply set back by loss of the Pennsylvania seat. As a result, party leaders are particularly anxious to see Thornburgh run.

“Dick Thornburgh’s decision to run for the Senate is good news for Republicans,” said Senate GOP leader Bob Dole of Kansas.

As attorney general, Thornburgh has had tense relations with many members of Congress--and some subordinates within the Justice Department itself--as he reorganized the structure he inherited from his predecessor, Edwin Meese III. But he has reveled in the opportunity to immerse himself in the details of legal issues, concentrating on expanding the department’s reach overseas in the quest to attack organized crime and drug traffic.

In keeping with Bush’s overall approach, Thornburgh has followed a generally conservative line on policy issues such as crime, civil rights and gun control. At the same time, however, he has put an end to the conservative ideological activism that marked the department during the Ronald Reagan Administration. Thornburgh also openly fought with Iran-Contra independent counsel Lawrence E. Walsh, forcing him to drop several prosecutions by refusing to declassify secret documents that were key to the cases.

Because his approach to most issues has closely reflected the President’s, Thornburgh’s departure is unlikely to lead to any major policy shifts.

Bush is under no particular pressure to name a successor right away, as Thornburgh will be in office for two more months. But White House officials have known that he might resign since April 4, when Sen. John Heinz died in an airplane crash, and they already have given some thought to filling the job.

One possibility would be to promote Deputy Atty. Gen. William Barr, who has been largely responsible for the day-to-day running of the department. Barr is popular in the White House and a friend of Bush’s influential White House counsel, C. Boyden Gray.

Secretary of Transportation Samuel K. Skinner said earlier this spring that he was not interested in the attorney general’s job, but friends have said that, in fact, he is. Bush’s trade representative, Carla Anderson Hills, who is mentioned for virtually all vacancies in the Administration, is being mentioned for this one, too. Another possibility under discussion is Sen. Warren B. Rudman (R-N.H.), although naming him would put another Republican Senate seat up for grabs and therefore may be unlikely.

The vacancy also has renewed speculation about current and former GOP officeholders Bush might bring to Washington. Some conservatives have been touting former California Gov. George Deukmejian, although Deukmejian’s friends have said he has no interest in leaving his private law practice.

In Los Angeles, Deukmejian spokesman Jim Robinson said the governor’s only comment concerning Thornburgh’s resignation was that he wanted to “commend” the attorney general for the job he had done, he was certain Bush would “have a number of excellent candidates” to consider and he would not answer “speculative, hypothetical, iffy questions” about whether he would be interested in the job.

Others have been pushing Missouri Gov. John Ashcroft, a former state attorney general who is a favorite of anti-abortion activists.

Whoever fills the post will find a department far different from the chaotic, scandal-plagued agency Thornburgh inherited when Reagan named him to replace Meese.

Throughout his career, Thornburgh has worked exclusively in executive branch positions, starting as a federal prosecutor in Pittsburgh, Pa., and serving two terms as governor of Pennsylvania before taking the Justice Department post in 1988. As a prosecutor, he jailed a number of state legislators and spoke widely against the legislative corruption common in Pennsylvania at the time.

In both Harrisburg and Washington, Thornburgh often was at odds with lawmakers, many of whom complained that he seemed to look down on their legislative roles as being less important than executive functions.

In almost three years on the job, Thornburgh has concentrated on organized crime, a key issue for him since his early days as U.S. attorney in Pittsburgh, where he prosecuted mob figures and crusaded against “the politico-rackets complex.” He has sought to strengthen centralized control over the department’s many branches.

Thornburgh also has tried to increase the power of U.S. attorneys, the top federal prosecutors in each of the nation’s judicial districts. He dismantled the once-independent organized crime strike forces, which had quarreled with many U.S. attorneys, and increased resources available to the prosecutors’ offices.

Another priority for him is the handicapped rights bill, an issue on which his wife, Virginia, has long been active.

Close associates say the Senate has held little attraction for Thornburgh. But at 58, he harbors hopes that a successful run at the office could position him for a slot on the national Republican ticket in 1996.

First, however, he will have to win the Senate seat, which is now held by Democrat Harris Wofford, a former civil rights aide to President John F. Kennedy and a top aide to Pennsylvania’s Democratic governor, who was appointed to fill the vacant seat last month. The two are expected to face off in November.

On Capitol Hill, Democratic senators demanded that Thornburgh step down immediately as attorney general if he is a candidate for the U.S. Senate.

Staff writer William J. Eaton contributed to this story.