THE TIMES POLL : Most County Party Leaders Pick Clinton, but Fear His Liabilities : Politics: Three-fifths of those Democrats surveyed say Arkansas governor is ‘most likely’ nominee. Interviews uncover doubts about the fall election.

Bill Clinton is the candidate that most county Democratic Party chairmen around the country say they believe has the best chance of winning the party’s presidential nomination, The Times Poll has found.

However, a majority of the county party leaders also say they think that the string of allegations against the Arkansas governor would hurt him in the general election, according to the poll.

About a third of the 149 county Democratic chairmen surveyed said they thought it “very likely” that their party’s nominee would win in November. Nearly three-fifths said they thought that prospect “somewhat likely” while about 10% acknowledged that they thought the Republicans were more likely to win.

In follow-up interviews, many of the county Democratic leaders sounded a dispirited note about their party’s chances in the fall.

“I’m a Democrat. I’m a good Democrat. (President) Bush is very beatable, and we just haven’t surfaced with a guy who can win,” said one Midwestern county chairman, a Clinton supporter who asked that his name not be used.

Clinton “has been strongly damaged” by the weeks of questions about his character, he said, and Paul E. Tsongas, the party’s other leading candidate, “just doesn’t generate enthusiasm” outside of his upper-income, white-collar base of support.

In Alabama, Chambers County Democratic Party leader Judy Lowe said she believes that none of the potential Democratic standard-bearers can carry the South. “Clinton could possibly have done it if he didn’t have all the baggage,” she said.

As for Tsongas, “I personally like him,” she said. But could he carry her state? “No.”

“Unless the economy just gets much, much worse, I think Bush will carry the South,” she said. Bush carried Chambers County, in the rural eastern part of Alabama, by a 3-to-2 margin in 1988.

The poll, supervised by Times Poll director John Brennan, surveyed 150 county Democratic chairmen Tuesday through Friday of last week and received responses from 149 of them. Several of the county leaders agreed to subsequent follow-up interviews.

The counties whose Democratic leaders were surveyed are a representative sample of the nation’s 3,248 counties, reflecting national general election turnout by region and community size.

In the poll, three-fifths of the county party leaders said Clinton is the “most likely” to win the nomination, but a smaller number, two-fifths, or 63, said he would be the “strongest person” the party could nominate.

Nevertheless, Clinton’s support outdistanced that of any of the other current candidates. Only 10 county Democratic chairmen said Tsongas, a former U.S. senator from Massachusetts, would be the strongest candidate; 10 picked Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin and eight picked Nebraska Sen. Bob Kerrey. No one picked former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr.--not surprising given the fact that Brown runs against the political Establishment. In fact, 80 of the chairmen called him the weakest candidate of the bunch.

Thirty, or roughly a fifth, of the chairmen surveyed said they thought New York Gov. Mario M. Cuomo would be the party’s strongest candidate. Those 30 came largely from the Northeast. But only three said they thought Cuomo actually would get the nod.

Of the 149 county Democratic chairmen surveyed, only seven said they thought Tsongas would get the nomination--despite his steady surge in polls of potential primary voters. But several of the county party leaders cautioned that Tsongas has confounded the political Establishment all along and could shatter more conventional expectations before the campaign ends.

“I am so surprised by what he’s done so far that I would not want to underestimate the man,” said Catherine Hart, Democratic chairwoman of Sarasota County on Florida’s western coast.

Prior to the New Hampshire primary, her office had received virtually no calls requesting information about Tsongas, but ever since, calls have come in steadily, she said.

“He comes across as a very honest person, a man of integrity,” she said.

As for Clinton, whom she supports, Hart said she would “like to think he could” overcome voters’ questions about his character, “but I’m not sure he can.”

The charges about Clinton’s Vietnam War-era draft status and unsubstantiated allegations of marital infidelity clearly worry many of the party officials. Nearly two-thirds say that at least one of the issues would damage Clinton in the general election; roughly one in eight characterize the damage as “major.”

In Austin, Tex., which Democratic presidential nominee Michael S. Dukakis carried in 1988, Travis County Democratic Chairman Gary Bledsoe said many voters in his relatively liberal area remain supportive of Clinton. “People like him,” he said.

But, he added, even many Clinton supporters “are concerned about whether he can win because of the allegations about him.”

Sounding an optimistic note, Bledsoe insisted that either Clinton or Tsongas could carry Texas in the fall as the party’s nominee. But Tsongas “would have to have a good, solid, moderate-to-conservative-type person” as a running mate, he said.

Not surprisingly, Clinton enjoys a higher level of support in the poll from Southern party leaders than from those in the rest of the country. Of 39 Southern county Democratic chairmen, 27 picked Clinton as the party’s strongest candidate. Of the 110 chairmen outside the South, only 36 picked Clinton as the strongest. Similarly, Clinton ran more strongly among the 66 chairmen who described themselves as moderates than among the 78 who described themselves as liberals.

But although Clinton has less support outside the South and among liberals, he still outpaces all his current rivals, even with those less-supportive groups.

Three of every five chairmen said Tsongas’ health would not harm his candidacy if he should be the party’s nominee. About a third said the issue would hurt him, but most of them said they thought the damage would be minor.

Tsongas quit his Senate seat in 1984 to battle cancer, a fight he says he has won.

THE TIMES POLL: Picking a Contender

A poll of 149 Democratic county chairmen shows Bill Clinton has the best chance of winning the party’s nomination. But a majority believe the string of allegations against him will hurt in the fall election. Numbers are actual responses, not percentages.

“Who do you think will most likely end up being the Democratic Party’s nominee for President this year?”

Bill Clinton: 89

Bob Kerry: 8

Paul E. Tsongas: 7

Tom Harkin: 5

Mario M. Cuomo: 3

Richard A. Gephardt: 1

Not Sure: 36

“Who do you think is the strongest person the Democratic Party can nominate to run for President this November?”

Bill Clinton: 63

Mario M. Cuomo: 30

Tom Harkin: 10

Paul E. Tsongas: 10

Bob Kerry: 8

Albert Gore Jr.: 7

Lloyd Bentsen: 4

Richard A. Gephardt: 4

Jesse Jackson: 1

Not Sure: 12

“If Bill Clinton is the party’s nominee, do you think the controversy over his alleged extramarital affair will hurt him in the general election or not? Will it do him major damage or minor damage?”

Will Hurt/Major Damage: 20

Will Hurt/Minor Damage: 57

Won’t Hurt Him: 71

Not Sure: 1

“If Bill Clinton is the party’s nominee, do you think the controversy over his Vietnam War-era draft status will hurt him in the general election or not? Will it do him major damage or minor damage?”

Will Hurt/Major Damage: 20

Will Hurt/Minor Damage: 57

Won’t Hurt Him: 69

Not Sure: 3