Clinton Leads in N.Y.; Exit Polls Point to Victory : Primaries: Tsongas, who has dropped out of the race, appears to be running neck and neck with Brown for second place. Arkansas governor also ahead in Kansas.

Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton took an early lead in the New York and Kansas primaries Tuesday, and exit polls of voters showed he would win both contests, reclaiming command of the Democratic presidential campaign after several wrenching and divisive weeks of political battling.

The exit polls showed former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr., the only other major Democrat still active in the race, running well behind Clinton in New York and Kansas.

Two other Democratic contests--a primary in Wisconsin and a “beauty contest” in Minnesota in which no delegates would be awarded--were too close to call between Clinton and Brown as votes were being counted Tuesday night.

Former Massachusetts Sen. Paul E. Tsongas, who dropped out of the race March 19 but flirted this week with re-entering, was running neck and neck with Brown for second place in New York, a Los Angeles Times exit poll found.

It was not clear whether Tsongas’ showing in New York--which he said was one determinant for his decision--would be sufficient to prod him back into the race. Tsongas had said earlier that his re-entry also turned on a poor showing for Clinton, and the latter did not appear to be in the works.

On the Republican side, President Bush was guaranteed most of the 197 delegates up for grabs in the four GOP contests--his challenger Patrick J. Buchanan was not on the ballot in New York, delivering the state’s 100 delegates to Bush automatically.

But the protest vote that has dogged Bush throughout this cantankerous primary season appeared to have surfaced again in Tuesday’s primary states. In Kansas, early returns showed roughly one-third of the electorate voting either for Buchanan or “uncommitted.”

Bush did no overt campaigning in the weeks leading up to the contests. In a statement issued by the White House, he called the results “another endorsement of our proposals for fundamental reform.”

As word spread of his projected victory in New York, Clinton took on the tone of an accommodating front-runner.

“I think if you look at it in different ways, the Brown campaign, the Tsongas campaign and our campaign have each taken a different part of a message of change to the American people,” Clinton told reporters in Arkansas.

“And there is wisdom in all of them, and they proved that if we can find a way to weld them all together in the best possible way, that we can change this country and win (the fall) election.”

Four states may have been holding simultaneous contests Tuesday, but the main stage was riotous New York, where Brown and Clinton came face to face with political factions unseen in any other environment.

The primary put them before the most diverse electorate of the campaign, and challenged their ability to form the types of coalitions needed for victory here. It was in pulling together the majority of most voter groups--including blacks and Jewish voters--that Clinton was scoring a broad, across-the-board victory.

The Arkansas governor entered the day with 1,101 delegates, more than half of the 2,145 necessary for nomination in July’s party convention here. And he appeared poised to collect the lion’s share of the delegates at stake--244 in New York, another 82 in Wisconsin and 36 in Kansas. Minnesota has 78 delegates, but they technically are not bound by Tuesday’s results.

Besides winning all 100 New York delegates, Bush was positioned to win the bulk of the 35 delegates in Wisconsin, Minnesota’s 32 and Kansas’ 30.

Going into Tuesday, Clinton was hoping that convincing victories would silence growing concerns among party leaders and voters that his candidacy had been unalterably weakened by assorted controversies. And Brown, trying mightily to stake his claim among disaffected voters, had predicted victory in New York and Wisconsin.

Brown campaigned in New York even as voters were going to the polls. At one stop, virtually hidden by a horde of reporters at a Brooklyn senior citizens’ center, he said in typical Brown fashion that the day’s results would mean “one of three things.”

“We’re going to do very well, or come close or not do well. It means whatever it means . . . . And I’m telling you, we’re going to surprise people.”

Clinton began his day in Arkansas, where he attended the funeral of Wal-Mart entrepreneur Sam Walton, who died Sunday. The governor also was briefed on an unexpected state budget deficit that will require him to cut $20 million in spending over the next three months to comply with the state’s balanced-budget law.

Before Tuesday’s results were known, Clinton expressed skepticism that even a strong victory would force Brown from the race. He also said he would not hazard a prediction about Tsongas’ plans.

Clinton, however, clearly was infuriated by the Brown campaign’s last-minute leafleting of New York’s black neighborhoods in which the insurgent candidate compared Arkansas to South Africa. It was “one of the more gutless things I’ve seen a politician do,” Clinton said.

A wild roller coaster of a race in New York and Wisconsin between the two men had been set by Brown’s upset victory over Clinton in the March 24 Connecticut primary and Tsongas’ withdrawal from the race several days earlier. The contest in Kansas was overlooked almost entirely; a brief stop by Clinton on Monday was the only visit by either candidate.

For Clinton, who before the Connecticut loss had signaled that he would consider Bush his opponent and the general election his target, the last two weeks have been the most disruptive since the days leading up to the Feb. 18 New Hampshire primary, when allegations of womanizing and questions about his draft status left his campaign hanging in the balance.

Clinton--who recovered from his problems in New Hampshire to stake out an overwhelming lead in the delegate count--stumbled in New York time after time, with national Democratic Party officials wringing their hands all the while. He came into the state forced to apologize for a recent round of golf at an all-white Arkansas country club, an incident that threatened his earlier lock on the black vote.

On Sunday, Clinton was ensnarled in new controversy when he acknowledged for the first time that he had received a draft induction notice before joining an ROTC program. Clinton had never mentioned the induction notice in detailed discussions of his draft status in February.