CONGRESSIONAL RACES : County Delegation Still Looks Solidly Republican : All four GOP incumbents on ballot leading in early returns, and the two in open races may make it a clean sweep.

The national anger that threatened incumbent members of Congress did not manifest itself Tuesday at polling places in Orange County, where early returns showed voters returning the four Republican congressmen on the ballot to Washington, even though they voted overwhelmingly in favor of term limits for their eventual successors.

And in the other two races where incumbents were not running, state Sen. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton) and Diamond Bar Mayor Jay C. Kim were also headed toward victory, apparently ensuring a Republican Party sweep of the congressional races that touch all or parts of Orange County.

While there were warnings that county voters might depart from past voting habits--signaled in part by the popularity of both Democratic presidential candidate Bill Clinton and independent candidate Ross Perot--the conservative Republican voting bloc in Orange County appeared to be holding together in the congressional races.

The closest race was in central Orange County, where incumbent Robert K. Dornan of Garden Grove was leading his Democratic challenger, Robert John Banuelos, by only a few points late Tuesday.

According to early returns, the front-runners were:

* 39th District. Royce, 41, a 10-year state senator, was leading Democrat Molly McClanahan, receiving roughly three out of every five votes cast. Libertarian candidate Jack Dean, 45, was trailing in third place. McClanahan, 55, a Fullerton City Council member, waged a spirited but underfunded campaign, partly by characterizing Royce as a status quo politician. Royce, who distanced himself from President Bush, touted his anti-crime record and victims’ rights legislation. The district includes portions of Orange and Los Angeles counties.

* 41st District. Kim, 53, held a 2-to-1 lead over Democrat Bob Baker, 40, a defense industry analyst from Anaheim. Peace and Freedom candidate Mike Noonan, 52, a Claremont pharmacist, was in third place in the district that straddles Orange, Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties. A Kim victory would make him the first Korean-American in Congress. Noonan complained late in the campaign that too much emphasis was being placed in the news media on Kim’s ethnicity. Kim, meanwhile, ran as a conservative Republican but parted with his party’s platform by favoring abortion rights.

* 45th District. Incumbent Dana Rohrabacher, 45, of Huntington Beach appeared to be holding off a challenge from Democrat Patricia McCabe, 43, also of Huntington Beach. Libertarian candidate Gary D. Copeland, 36, of Fountain Valley was a distant third. Rohrabacher, seeking a third term, portrayed his challenger as inexperienced and unfamiliar with the district’s defense industry. But McCabe, a certified public accountant, criticized Rohrabacher for employing divisive rhetoric.

* 46th District. In the only district in which Democrats had more registered voters than Republicans, Dornan, 59, was ahead of Banuelos, 40, and Libertarian candidate Richard G. Newhouse, 45, a Garden Grove college professor. Dornan first went to Congress in 1976, representing Santa Monica, and later was elected from Orange County in 1984. He handily won a Republican primary battle last June against Judith Ryan, and confidently predicted he would win 55.8% of Tuesday’s vote. He blamed his poorer-than-expected showing on his Libertarian opponent who he said was having “a Ross Perot effect.” Banuelos, the second-place candidate from Santa Ana, spent only about $5,000, and was counting on a larger-than-usual Latino turnout spurred by the reelection campaign of Assemblyman Tom Umberg (D-Garden Grove).

* 47th District. Republican Christopher Cox, 40, of Newport Beach appeared to be winning a third term, leading Democrat John F. Anwiler, 49. Peace and Freedom candidate Maxine B. Quirk, 70, an Orange apartment owner/manager, was trailing in third place. The race also featured the county’s only write-in congressional candidate, Dr. Barry Charles of the Natural Law Party.

* 48th District. Incumbent Ron Packard, 61, of Oceanside was leading Democrat Michael Farber, 32, of Escondido, a former land broker and development consultant, Peace and Freedom candidate Donna White and Libertarian candidate Ted Low, 51, of Oceanside. Packard held a 2-to-1 margin over Farber, heading for a sixth term.