Hopefuls Debate Amid Flurry of New Attacks : Democrats: TV face-off is last for the candidates before N.H. primary. They use time for a summing up.

Democratic presidential hopefuls met Sunday in the final debate before Tuesday’s vote and used the opening hour of the 90-minute encounter largely to restate their by-now familiar stump speeches.

Former Sen. Paul E. Tsongas of Massachusetts emphasized his theme that he is the candidate of truth, even correcting one of his questioners who attributed to him a quotation he had borrowed from author David Halberstam. “I do not wish to take credit for something I did not originate,” he said.

Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton urged voters to focus on his record of accomplishing change. “All these plans may be good, but in the end, someone has to lead,” he said.

Sen. Tom Harkin insisted Democrats must offer a “clear choice” in contrast with President Bush and the Republicans and accused his rivals of offering plans for “fine tuning” what the Republicans have done.

Sen. Bob Kerrey of Nebraska touted his plan for national health care, saying the voters should seek a candidate who had the “courage” to “fight right now” for health care reform.

And former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr. repeated his claim that a 13% flat tax would eliminate the “corruption” of massive election campaign contributions.

The debate, which the campaigns had seen as the final major opportunity to sway votes in what all see as a volatile election, came amid a flurry of last-minute charges and attacks.

Harkin, still mired far behind in the polls, attacked two rival Democrats on the abortion issue, sending out a direct-mail letter in the name of a dummy women’s organization. The mailer makes inaccurate charges against Clinton and Kerrey in an attempt to question their commitment to the pro-choice position on the volatile issue.

Kerrey, meanwhile, held a press conference at which he attacked his own pollster, who was caught anonymously faxing criticisms of Clinton’s draft record to several news organizations earlier this week. Kerrey referred to the pollster, Harrison Hickman, as “Harrison Hitman” and angrily told reporters, “I feel he has betrayed me.”

Kerrey said Hickman, who he first hired for a campaign in 1982, would now be on probation.

Clinton, in an interview on ABC’s “This Week With David Brinkley,” jokingly referred to the allegations about his personal life and Vietnam-era draft status that seemingly stalled his campaign efforts. “For two or three weeks, I was virtually a one-man landfill,” with the accusations being dumped almost daily. But, he added, “I think one of the tests of a President is whether or not that man or woman can live with the pressure, take the heat and go on.”

“Time is on my side,” he told reporters later.

With polls continuing to show him running second, Clinton’s strategists hope he will do well enough in Tuesday’s balloting to overtake Tsongas, the current leader, when the race leaves New Hampshire and heads south.

Tsongas, interviewed on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” insisted that if he wins here, his campaign will gather strength elsewhere even though the economic plan around which his campaign has been built contains a host of positions generally unpopular with Democrats. These include a gasoline tax increase that would weigh most heavily on low-income people and targeted cuts in the capital gains tax that generally would help upper-income families.

His proposals may be politically difficult, Tsongas said, but they are needed for the country to return to economic health. “I know adversity, and the only way you deal with adversity is accept it, deal with it, be resolute, and overcome it,” he said. “My path is steeper, I grant you that, and it’s harder. But at the end of it, you’re at the top of the mountain, not in the abyss.”

Harkin, who also appeared on the Brinkley program, appeared to try to change his message. For weeks he had been insisting he was the only “real Democrat” in the race, accusing his rivals of imitating Republicans. Polls indicate that many voters have rejected that message, finding it out of date.

But on the program, Harkin said, “I’m not saying I’m the only Democrat in the race.” What he was saying, Harkin insisted, was that he offered “new ideas.”

To hammer home that point, Harkin repeated the word “new” eight separate times and the word “different” seven times within the course of an interview that lasted only about 10 minutes.

Harkin also defended his controversial direct-mail attack on Clinton and Kerrey.

The mailing inaccurately accused Clinton of signing a bill requiring parental consent before a minor could receive an abortion in Arkansas. The law in question requires minors to notify parents of their abortion plans in most cases, but allows a minor to inform a judge, instead, in some cases and does not require parents to consent to the procedure.

The letter also overstated Kerrey’s past opposition to abortion, a position that the Nebraska senator has since changed. “By Bob’s own admission, his opinions on abortion were not in any way completely formulated” when he first ran for office in 1982, said Kerrey spokesman Steve Jarding. Since then, he “clearly came down on the pro-choice side,” Jarding said.

Asked about the mailing, Harkin described it as something done by “an organization of women and others that have gotten together.” In fact, the organization whose name appears on the mailing, the Women’s Campaign Coalition, has no listed telephone number. Its address is identical to Harkin’s New Hampshire campaign headquarters.

Sunday evening, Harkin spokesman Barry Toiv described the group as being “affiliated with the campaign.”

Harkin has a history of using the abortion issue for last-minute political attacks. Just before Election Day in his first Senate campaign, Harkin mailed a letter to voters saying his Republican opponent, who opposed abortion, would support using the death penalty against women who had abortions. The opponent, Roger Jepsen, angrily denied the charge.

Harkin’s own stand on abortion also has its murky side. In 1984, Harkin told students at a Catholic high school in Des Moines that, “as a lifelong Catholic . . . I yield to no one in my total opposition to the practice of abortion.” Harkin’s press secretary, Lorraine Voles, subsequently described that statement as reflecting Harkin’s personal view but said “his personal views have never gotten in the way” of policy decisions.