Support for Thomas Holds Despite Charges : Judiciary: Senate apparently will take confirmation vote today without delving into sex harassment issue.

Senate backing for Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas softened slightly on Monday, but he continued to command the support of a majority of the members as they prepared to vote today on a controversial appointment made even more contentious by last-minute allegations of sexual harassment.

University of Oklahoma law professor Anita Faye Hill, the nominee’s reluctant accuser, appeared on national television Monday to repeat her charges that Thomas had harassed her sexually on several occasions and to defend her own character.

“It is an unpleasant issue. It is an ugly issue, and people don’t want to deal with it generally and, in particular, in this case,” Hill said, rejecting suggestions that she was motivated by political bias. “There is absolutely no basis . . . that I am somehow involved in some political plan to undermine the nominee.”

Opponents of the nomination sought--apparently without success--to delay today’s scheduled vote, while vehement arguments about Hill’s charges dominated Senate floor debate and women’s groups and others expressed outrage at the Senate’s apparent intention not to delve further into Hill’s allegations--despite her offer to cooperate fully with any investigation.

At a press conference, Hill reacted forcefully to a White House assertion over the weekend that its review of an FBI report on her allegations showed her charges to be “unfounded.”

“It is my understanding that the FBI investigation did not reach any conclusion of any sort,” Hill said. Her statement was supported by sources who have read the FBI report and said it was inconclusive--essentially pitting Hill’s word against Thomas’ word.

That being the case, said Sen. Alan J. Dixon (D-Ill.), “I would have no choice other than to” continue supporting Thomas.

Some women’s groups expressed outrage at the Senate’s apparent intention not to delve further into Hill’s allegations--despite her offer to cooperate fully with any investigation.

But Thomas’ supporters, including President Bush, said that they expect him to be confirmed for a seat on the high court. The vote is scheduled for 6 p.m. EDT.

At the White House, the President said that he was “not in the least” concerned about Hill’s charges that Thomas had repeatedly made sexually suggestive comments to her when she was his senior aide at two federal agencies between 1981 and 1983.

When asked whether the Senate vote should be delayed and the allegations investigated further, Bush shook his head. “He still has my full confidence, obviously, and I think he will be and should be confirmed,” the President told reporters during a Rose Garden photo session with visiting Angolan rebel leader Jonas Savimbi.

On Capitol Hill, as senators debated the merits of Hill’s charges--and rehashed Thomas’ qualifications--members of the Senate Judiciary Committee and their staffs were scrambling to explain the seeming delay of about two weeks between the time Hill first talked with Senate staff members and the time the FBI was asked to investigate her charges.

For all the firestorm, touched off Sunday after Newsday and National Public Radio disclosed Hill’s allegations, no senator on Monday professed to an outright change of mind on the confirmation question.

“It looks like we’re going to get through,” one Bush Administration official said.

As of last week, 41 of 43 Republican senators were on record as supporting Thomas, and 13 of the Senate’s 57 Democrats had declared their intention to vote for him--a total of 54 votes. Late in the day, Sen. J. James Exon (D-Neb.), who had announced his support for Thomas last week, called for a one-week delay in the vote. He said that he now is undecided and that the Hill matter “simply cannot be swept up and brushed under the rug without checking into the likely authenticity of the charges and countercharges.”

Such a delay would require the consent of all 100 senators.

Several other announced Democratic supporters of Thomas also left themselves wiggle room by saying that they wanted to take a look at the FBI report. Still other senators, including Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), David L. Boren (D-Okla.), Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.) and Richard C. Shelby (D-Ala.), also said that they wanted to read the report.

But the Republicans were, if anything, hardening their support as they protested that opponents were springing a desperate “October surprise” reminiscent of a last-minute election campaign smear.

“I have not noticed any slippage (in support),” said Sen. John C. Danforth (R-Mo.), Thomas’ chief sponsor. “In fact, I believe there may even be a backlash. There may even be some senators who have been leaning against Clarence Thomas who will now say we can’t have this body known as the trash dump of American politics.”

Still, one previously uncommitted Republican, liberal James M. Jeffords of Vermont, announced that he would vote against the nomination because it would make the Supreme Court too conservative. But Jeffords was thought to have been leaning against Thomas before the Hill controversy.

Sen. Dennis DeConcini (D-Ariz.), the only Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee to support Thomas, strongly reaffirmed his position, declaring that Hill’s charges are unsubstantiated and that the nominee’s “credibility is very firm.”

Sen. John B. Breaux (D-La.), noting that not even Thomas’ opponents on the Judiciary Committee had made an issue of Hill’s allegations, said that he saw no reason to delay the vote or oppose the nomination.

Similarly, Sen. J. Bennett Johnston (D-La.) said: “If there was anything to the charge, the committee would have brought it out. I give that (allegation) zero credence.”

For the most part, Thomas’ backers, including the White House, were careful not to blame Hill for the attack and refused to comment publicly on the details of her allegations. They apparently were attempting to avoid a confrontation with a woman who might be regarded as a credible witness.

“We simply aren’t going to go into the details,” White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said. He rebuffed requests for elaboration, declaring: “There’s no sense trying to create another fight over this.”

But Thomas’ foes were still pressing for a delay. “It is unseemly to suggest that a charge as serious as this would be handled in a manner that suggests they are doing it hastily,” said Emma Coleman Jordan, a Georgetown University law professor who is president-elect of the Assn. of American Law Schools.

“If he is confirmed, it will be for a lifetime. The Senate has got to--they must--stop and do a further investigation in a manner that leads to public accountability,” she said.

Jordan, who has studied issues facing black women in the legal community, said that it is the Senate, not Hill, whose credibility should be questioned. “All 100 senators will have a chance to be counted on this issue,” she said.

In Norman, Okla., Hill, 35, spoke at a press conference in a large classroom at the University of Oklahoma Law Center, where she is now a tenured professor.

She appeared tired but composed and calm, clearly reveling in the outpouring of support for her from students and colleagues gathered in the room.

Hill stressed repeatedly that she had not sought to make her allegations public. She said that she had decided when Thomas was nominated not to come forward with her story.

“It was a troubled decision for me to make. It’s not something that I wanted to grandstand about. I had made a personal choice not to come forward. However, I’m not convinced that was the right choice,” she said.

Eventually, she changed her mind. But even then, Hill said, she never intended for her charges against Thomas to become public. She granted press interviews only after the media had obtained a copy of an affidavit she gave to investigators, she noted.

Curiously, the controversy ignited as many calls in the Senate to investigate who leaked the affidavit to the press as to look into the veracity of the woman’s allegations.

The events began in early September, when staff members of the Senate Labor and Natural Resources subcommittee headed by Sen. Howard M. Metzenbaum contacted Hill as part of an effort to check out Thomas’ working relationship with women--in part because of “rumors,” according to the Ohio Democrat.

On Sep. 9, James J. Brudney, the panel’s chief counsel and a former Yale Law School classmate of Hill, received a call from a third person who said that Hill wanted to speak to him, Metzenbaum said.

Brudney contacted Hill the next day--when she “first made the allegation concerning Thomas,” Metzenbaum said.

The next morning, the senator directed his staff to make a report to the Judiciary Committee staff.

According to Senate sources, it was Hill’s initial desire to have her charges remain private--they said she specifically asked that Thomas not be informed of her allegations--that caused a delay in getting her charges to members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. That delay, in turn, put off an FBI inquiry, they said.

“She wanted all the committee members to be apprised of her allegations--without the public being told,” a committee staff member said.

“She also did not want Thomas to be told of her allegations,” he added. “But it’s the committee’s long-standing practice to never disseminate allegations to committee members unless the nominee (being accused) is also made aware of them as well. She was told this. But, at that point, she was not willing to do that.”

At her press conference, Hill said: “ . . . I wanted all the members to know, with my name, but I was not willing to have it made public.”

When Hill began to suspect that her allegations were not getting to all of the members, she said, she asked a staff aide: “What do I have to do to get this before the committee?”

It was at that point, in late September, that committee staff members persuaded her to consent to an FBI investigation--meaning that Thomas as well as all the members of the Judiciary Committee would be notified of her charges.

A subsequent FBI investigation was conducted and the report was issued two days later, on Sept. 25--two days before the Judiciary Committee was to vote on the nomination.

Chairman Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) and Sen. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina, the ranking Republican on the panel, sent the report to the White House and then privately briefed Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell and Minority Leader Bob Dole, sources said.

And, in the 24 hours before the vote, Biden and/or the committee’s staff briefed each committee member. “So they were all aware of that before the (7-7) vote,” said one committee source who asked to remain anonymous.

Many who are skeptical of Hill’s charges have asked why, despite the alleged harassment by Thomas, Hill joined him when he left the Department of Education for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Hill said at her press conference that, by then, Thomas’ advances had stopped and that she was afraid she would not be able to find another job in government if she quit.

“There was a period in which the activity stopped,” she said. “So, I was under the impression at that time that I could go about doing my business.”

She said she was 25 years old and had been with the federal government for nine months when Thomas asked her to move with him to EEOC.

“If I quit, I would have been jobless,” Hill said. “I wanted to stay in civil rights. I thought I had something to add. In hindsight now, I can say that this was not the right decision.”

Hill also addressed a statement put out by the White House that she had invited Thomas to speak at the University of Oklahoma last spring. She said that, in fact, she opposed his giving the speech and had refused to invite him when asked to do so. She did, however, telephone his chambers at the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington after others had issued him an invitation--simply to make sure, she said, that it was brought to his attention.

Hill’s story here was backed up by Kevin Saunders, the law school professor who headed the committee that invited Thomas.

Chen reported from Washington and Frantz reported from Norman, Okla. Times staff writers Paul Houston, Douglas Jehl and Ronald J. Ostrow contributed to this story from Washington.