NATION IN BRIEF : WASHINGTON, D.C. : 45 House Members Admit to Bad Checks

The list of House members admitting they wrote rubber checks at a congressional bank climbed to 45, including congressmen who complained they were being tarred for a single slip-up. The Associated Press tally of House members who have admitted writing checks with insufficient funds was still well short of the figures disclosed by the General Accounting Office, which said 134 members bounced checks of at least $1,000 during a six-month period. The General Accounting Office report found that House members had bounced 8,331 checks at the bank in the year ending June 30, 1990. The bank paid the overdrawn checks without penalty, even though hundreds of them were in excess of $1,000.