Panel Sees Barr as ‘People’s Attorney General’ : Law: The nominee wins bipartisan plaudits. Many senators consider him as no mere servant of the White House, despite being a conservative ideologue.

The easy confirmation of William P. Barr as the nation’s next attorney general struck many observers as ironic: Barr is much more the ideologue, a man of lifelong conservative convictions, than his pragmatic predecessor, Dick Thornburgh, whose relations with the Senate ranged from infrequent to icy.

But most members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which endorsed Barr 14 to 0, and those who spoke up when he won full Senate confirmation by voice vote last Wednesday seem convinced that Barr will become “the people’s attorney general” when he is sworn in Tuesday.

Indeed, Barr’s own testimony before the Judiciary Committee suggests that he has no intention of becoming a mere servant of the White House, eager to lend a hand whenever needed for a President in an election year.

“Nothing could be more destructive of our system of government, of the rule of law, or the Department of Justice as an institution than any toleration of political interference with the enforcement of the law,” Barr told the panel.

To be sure, some of the collegiality directed at Barr reflected the desire of Judiciary Committee members to avoid the kind of criticism they received during their emotion-charged hearings into sexual abuse charges leveled against Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas.

But the bipartisan plaudits heaped on Barr--the same official who served as Thornburgh’s chief legal adviser and then as his deputy attorney general--clearly involved more than a desire to prevent another confirmation spectacle.

The question of whether an attorney general is just another Cabinet officer carrying out the President’s program or an official whose legal mission requires him to remain at arm’s length from the White House dates back to the origin of the 202-year-old office and the creation of the Justice Department nearly a century later.

It has nagged presidents and attorneys general of both parties. At one point, it prompted Jimmy Carter’s attorney general, Griffin B. Bell, to propose that the post be filled for a term different than the President’s, a degree of independence Bell later decided would be unconstitutional.

The special status of the attorney general as the nation’s chief legal official came into question last week when President Bush’s counsel, C. Boyden Gray, circulated a draft policy statement that would have cut back longstanding federal policies promoting the hiring of women and minorities.

Although the draft was retracted after at least three Cabinet officers, including Barr, voiced objections, the incident illustrated the extent to which the responsibility for highly sensitive civil rights policies has shifted from the attorney general to the White House under George Bush.

It also called into question whether Barr, who at 41 is among the youngest attorneys general of the modern era, will be able to reassert the major voice in civil rights matters that his office has sounded in the past. Indeed, Gray and other White House officials were in the forefront of those urging that Barr be named to succeed Thornburgh.

Unlike other Cabinet officers, the attorney general wears several hats, and the varying responsibilities sometimes do not fit well.

University of Virginia law professor Daniel J. Meador, a former assistant attorney general and author of a leading study on the responsibilities of the office, has identified several distinct roles that any attorney general must assume:

* Cabinet member;

* Attorney, representing the United States in court and providing legal advice to the President and heads of executive departments;

* Administrator, not only of the Justice Department, but also the FBI, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Marshals Service;

* Lobbyist, particularly before congressional committees on justice issues;

* Judge-picker, playing a key role in selecting federal judges;

* Reformer, of the nation’s criminal and civil justice system;

* Symbol, of American justice.

The ability of the attorney general to perform these varied roles “is sharply affected by public perception,” noted Warren Christopher, deputy attorney general during the Lyndon B. Johnson Administration and deputy secretary of state under Carter.

The attorney general “is the nation’s primary repository of public confidence that the laws will be faithfully and impartially enforced,” Christopher said during a recent symposium on the attorney general’s roles and responsibilities.

“When that confidence erodes, public cynicism mounts, the lawless take comfort, the law-abiding look elsewhere for protection and . . . recruiting and retention of the most outstanding people for the (Justice Department) is severely compromised,” Christopher said.

At his confirmation hearing, Barr was asked how he would balance his role as attorney general of the people with his responsibility and loyalty to Bush.

“I think the starting point for understanding the attorney general’s role is the fact that the law stands above everything,” he said. “Everybody is subordinate to the law, and we are a government of laws.”

In providing legal advice to the President and Cabinet members, Barr said, the attorney general has as obligation like any lawyer “to tell it like it is, to provide accurate legal advice . . . “

The most sensitive role is that of enforcing and administering the law, Barr said. “That is where . . . the tension is sometimes said to exist between politics and doing justice,” he told the committee. “That is the area were the attorney general must keep the administration of justice away from and above politics.”

The committee’s emphasis on the attorney general’s independence proved too much for Sen. Alan K. Simpson (R-Wyo.).

Noting that the attorney general can be fired at will by the President, Simpson said that executive branch appointees “are not really intended to be impartial the way a judge is required to be,” and are “supposed to put into effect the program of their President.”

“We are not looking for judicious impartiality in Mr. Barr,” Simpson added. “Instead, we are looking for an honest and capable person who will fairly and effectively advance the program of the President.”