Clinton Sweeping the South : Tsongas Takes Massachusetts; Bush Winning : Democrats: Arkansas governor, running far ahead in Florida and Texas, re-establishes himself as the front-runner. Elections are held in 11 states.

Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton was running far ahead in delegate-rich Texas and Florida and was sweeping the other Southern states in early returns from Super Tuesday’s far-flung presidential sweepstakes, re-establishing himself as the front-runner for his party’s nomination.

Former Massachusetts Sen. Paul E. Tsongas, Clinton’s principal rival, had his chief success in his home state, which he was winning easily as expected. He was also projected by network analysts to win the Rhode Island primary and the Delaware caucuses. But it appeared Tsongas had done no better than second in the Southern states, including Florida, where he had made his biggest commitment of time and resources.

In addition to Florida and Texas, Clinton appeared to have won Mississippi, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Louisiana.

Tsongas “had his worst week of the campaign and we had our best,” said George Stephanopolous, Clinton’s deputy campaign manager.

But Tsongas put a brave face on the results. “We’re on our way to the White House,” he told a victory rally in his hometown of Lowell, Mass. He cited a Washington Post-ABC poll that showed him beating President Bush by 5 percentage points, 3 points more than Clinton was ahead of Bush.

The third man in the Democratic race, former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr., had his best showing in the early returns in Massachusetts, where he was in a tight contest for second place with Clinton. He was also running second in Mississippi.

All told, delegate contests were waged in 11 states, from Hawaii to Rhode Island. But seven of them were in Dixie or on its borders, which gave the day its special cast and gave Clinton an obvious advantage that he fully exploited.

A network exit poll showed Clinton taking 68% of vote among native-born Southerners, contrasted with 19% for Tsongas and 8% for Brown.

Once again, as in the Georgia and South Carolina primaries last week, blacks made a big contribution to Clinton’s victory. He got about 80% of the black vote across the South, according to network exit polls, contrasted with 59% of the white vote.

Even on this day of triumph, concern over Clinton’s controversial draft status during the Vietnam War cast a shadow. Of Southern Democratic voters polled, 20% said this issue made them think less favorably of Clinton, though one-third of these voted for him anyway.

A Times exit poll in Texas and Florida showed that Clinton voters’ main reasons for supporting him were that he cared about people like them, was a strong leader and could be an effective agent of change.

Tsongas voters, by contrast, picked trust, integrity and values as the main reasons for supporting him. These answers appeared to reflect not only their confidence in Tsongas, but also their misgivings about Clinton because of the draft controversy and earlier allegations that he had been unfaithful to his wife, which together had damaged his campaign in New Hampshire, when polls had him far in front of the field.

In the frantic days of campaigning that preceded Tuesday’s day of decision, the contrasting objectives of the three Democratic contenders reflected the differences in their prospects and resources.

For Clinton, the balloting presented the opportunity to take a giant step forward in the delegate race and to gain momentum for next week’s critical contests in Illinois and Michigan.

“It’s always been the case that we had more money and more organization than anybody else,” said Craig Smith, Clinton’s deputy campaign manager on the eve of the balloting. “Our strategy has been to go in and win as many states as we can and roll up a big delegate margin.”

Perhaps just as important as these tangible assets in helping Clinton was the region’s demography. It created an environment more receptive to Clinton’s economic message--centered on his call for a small tax cut for middle-class families--than Tsongas’ doctrine of relying mainly on tax incentives for business to generate growth.

“The clarity of choice between Clinton and Tsongas on economic policy works to our advantage in the South more than in states like Maryland and New Hampshire,” where Tsongas won, said David Wilhelm, Clinton’s campaign manager. “There are more middle-income voters and more working families.”

Under these circumstances, the Super Tuesday confrontation represented mainly an exercise in damage control for Tsongas. Seeking to minimize the impact of defeat, the candidate and his managers conceded the outcome well in advance.

They set their goal as finishing a “strong second” everywhere, particularly in Florida, Super Tuesday’s most competitive battleground. And they pointed to what they claimed would be more positive results elsewhere in the country next week.

“Once Super Tuesday is over he (Clinton) has to go into the rest of the country, and we’ve done better there,” said Tsongas campaign manager Dennis Kanin, citing his candidate’s victories in New Hampshire and Maryland.

As for Brown, the self-styled candidate of protest, the balloting offered a chance to enhance the credibility his candidacy gained with his victories in Colorado and Nevada. Waging his guerrilla style of political warfare from Dixie to New England, Brown sometimes seemed mainly a threat to Tsongas’ support, particularly when he appealed for the vote of environmentalists by demanding a ban on ozone-threatening products.

But Brown also sought to make inroads in Clinton’s backing among minorities, telling a rally of Latinos in El Paso: “You know you’re being ripped off, lied to, shined on.”

Here is a brief look at how the contest took shape in the biggest battlegrounds:

--FLORIDA: 148 delegates. With 34% of the vote counted, Clinton led Tsongas, 51% to 32%, with Brown trailing at 15%.

Tsongas was drawn into making his biggest Super Tuesday commitment of time and resources here mainly because of demographics--the presence of more expatriate Northerners, more suburbanites and more upper-income voters than anywhere else in the South. Those characteristics have defined Tsongas voters in past primaries.

Recent political history seemed encouraging too. In the last two Democratic presidential campaigns, Florida has been won by non-Southern candidates who, like Tsongas, won the New Hampshire primary--former Colorado Sen. Gary Hart in 1984 and former Massachusetts Gov. Michael S. Dukakis in 1988.

But as Tsongas strategists soon realized, circumstances were more favorable for Hart--who was running against another non-Southerner, former Vice President Walter F. Mondale--and for Dukakis--who had financial and organizational assets that in the 1992 contest are possessed by Clinton, not Dukakis.

Clinton’s operation had daily polling to guide it. By contrast, Rob Schroth, Tsongas’ state coordinator, conceded, “The only way I can find out what is going on is by talking to voters, to reporters and to the Clinton people.”

More important, Clinton strategists contend, Tsongas hurt his own cause. Instead of concentrating solely on his theme of economic revival, they point out, he spent much of the past few days attacking Clinton, calling the Arkansas governor “cynical and unprincipled.” He was also forced to deal with Clinton’s attacks on him for favoring a gasoline tax, for allegedly being insufficiently supportive of Israel and for supposedly being willing to tamper with Social Security cost-of-living allowances.

“He got off his message for three days and it hurt him,” said Jeff Eller, Clinton’s state coordinator. Kanin concedes that Tsongas’ shift in emphasis may have undercut his message but asserts that his candidate had no choice but to hit back at Clinton. “What Clinton was doing was attacking him all over Florida on whatever issue appealed most in that area,” Kanin said.

--TEXAS: 196 delegates. With 4% of the vote counted, Clinton lead Tsongas, 63% to 20%, with Brown at 6%.

Clinton helped himself by coming to Texas early and often, as well as by capitalizing on friendships in the state that go back more than 20 years. “He’s paid a lot of attention to this state,” said George Christian, an Austin political consultant and former aide to former President Lyndon B. Johnson. “He’s here every time you turn around.”

Because of that, Clinton has lined up an impressive list of endorsements from elected and party officials and from leaders of key interest groups.

“He’s got the who’s who of the Mexican community and the who’s who of the black community on his side,” said George Shipley, a Democratic consultant who guided Texas Gov. Ann Richard’s campaign to victory in 1990.