Campaign Has Turned Corner in Pennsylvania, Clinton Says : Politics: Democratic front-runner says primary results prove that he can get his message across.

He still may have to deal with George Bush and Ross Perot, and with an economy that could stumble to recovery, but Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton said he was sure that Tuesday marked the turning point in his campaign for the presidency.

“Let’s make this victory in Pennsylvania the beginning of a new chapter in this campaign,” the front-runner for the Democratic nomination said at a fund-raiser that drew a crowd of several hundred people to Boston’s Faneuil Hall on Tuesday evening. “I haven’t felt this good campaigning for a long time.”

He had been buoyed by the numbers all day, with the television networks’ exit poll showing him ahead of his remaining rival, former California governor Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr., by a 2-to-1 margin.

And, according to the poll, nearly two-thirds of Pennsylvania Democrats casting ballots said Clinton does have the honesty and integrity to be President. That is a reversal from polls in other states, where Democratic voters, at best, have been evenly split on the issue.

In a Los Angeles Times Poll earlier this week, only 35% of Californians said Clinton was honest enough to be President, while 48% said he was not.

In a brief press conference at Logan Airport, Clinton termed the exit poll “a big pickup from New York”--which he won on April 7, despite a 35%-35% split on the honesty question.

Earlier in the day, Clinton said the Pennsylvania results prove that when he can talk to average voters about the issues--without attacks from Democratic rivals or New York’s tabloid newspapers--he can get his message across.

“Every time this election gets back to the real people, it turns out all right,” he said.

Despite the good news from Pennsylvania, Clinton had to answer discomfiting questions as he passed through a series of fund-raisers in Philadelphia, New Jersey and Boston.

He was asked about The Times Poll showing him trailing Brown, 51% to 37%, among registered Democrats in California. The same poll showed him coming in third in a three-way race behind Bush and Perot, who were tied for the lead.

Clinton answered that he would not comment on how the voters might judge Perot, the Texas billionaire who has said he will run as an independent if volunteers can get him on all 50 state ballots.

“I’m going to try to show that I’m the best person,” he said.

Clinton insisted that he was not surprised by Brown’s apparent strength among Californians, saying: “It’s his state.”

At his Faneuil Hall appearance, Clinton asserted that the Bush and Ronald Reagan administrations make the Republicans an easy target. The voters only need to be asked the same question Reagan asked them in 1980: Are they better off now than they were four years ago? “If we hold George Bush to his standard, he is a gone dog, as we say,” Clinton said, drawing a roar of approval from the crowd.

Despite Clinton’s exuberance at his Pennsylvania showing, the three-week campaign leading up to it was bumpy. He seemed to connect with the state’s largely blue-collar audience with his promise of an activist government and high-wage jobs in a new global economy, but the crowds in the former steel towns and coal valleys were often small--sometimes fewer than 100 people.

One presence at Faneuil Hall was a reminder of what will happen if Clinton is unable to connect with voters. In the audience, clapping politely, was Michael S. Dukakis, who won the Pennsylvania primary in 1988 with 67% of the vote but was trounced across the country in November.

Dukakis slipped out moments after the event, but when asked his advice for Clinton, he told a reporter: “If I knew anything about this business, I’d be talking to you from the Oval Office now.”