COLUMN RIGHT / TONY SNOW : Can Clinton Put Congress in Its Place? : The reins intended to check Republican presidents will hobble a Democrat, too.

When Team Clinton moves into the White House, it should decorate each office with a sign that reads, “The Congress, Stupid.”

Congress, not the economy, most threatens a Clinton presidency. Democrats in Congress have hollowed out the President’s domestic-policy powers over the past 20 years in response to Republican dominance of the Oval Office. They have complicated executive-branch life by summoning officials for redundant appearances on Capitol Hill (last year’s defense budget went through 30 committees and 77 subcommittees). They have paralyzed administrations through investigations generated by the independent-counsel law (which does not apply to Congress). And they have stripped away presidential impoundment authority, which enabled previous presidents to control spending.

By so fettering the presidency, Congress has acquired the ability to frustrate executive initiatives. Congress, for instance, let President Bush’s urban-aid package molder for weeks after the Los Angeles riots--and then submitted a pork-filled bill that the President was forced to veto.

Bill Clinton will be the first Democrat to feel the full weight of strictures intended for Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and George Bush. Even though he has recruited such experienced Capitol hands as Lloyd Bentsen and Leon Panetta, that won’t help much. Members of Congress aren’t sentimental about old ties.

No Congress will surrender willingly powers it has spent two decades acquiring. As James Madison warned more than 200 years ago, the national legislature “is everywhere extending the sphere of its activity and drawing all power into its impetuous vortex.”

In terms of strict power politics, Clinton would do well to devise two plans for rebuilding the presidency: a Nice Guy Plan, and a Tough Guy Plan.

Under the Nice Guy plan, he would use his bully pulpit to create public sympathy for a reform agenda. We tried this approach during the Bush Administration and it failed. The public didn’t care about the dull particulars of congressional or budget reform. Still, a President must try the extended-hand approach.

Next would come the Tough Guy plan. Clinton ought to insist that the new independent-counsel law apply equally to Congress and the judiciary.

He must also restrain spending. Otherwise, his economic-stimulus proposal will stimulate the appetites of politicians eager to ship pork back home.

To make matters worse, he won’t be able to use the veto as liberally as his Republican predecessors. If a Democratic President exercises the veto too often, he will appear at war with his party. If he uses it too little, he will look like a yes man for Congress. Still, he needs a foolproof method for excising congressional pork that could corrupt his reforms.

Consider three options, in order of toughness: first, the “implicit” item veto. Constitutional lawyer Gregory Sidak argues that a President can veto appropriations not related to the bills in which they appear--say, money for amusement parks buried in defense appropriations.

Second, Clinton could refuse to expend funds on selected programs. Present law permits a President to withhold funds for 45 calendar days or until both houses of Congress tell him to spend. The President-elect, by choosing a properly ridiculous program, could focus public attention on outrageous spending.

That may not be enough, however. When President Bush asked Congress to eliminate funding for such oddities as mink reproduction research, Congress didn’t even blush. The silly stuff stayed.

Clinton thus may have to entertain a third option: vetoing the legislative branch appropriation--funding for Congress and its appendages--and demanding as ransom a line-item veto.

This may not be as risky as it seems. It’s hard to imagine in this age of safe incumbency and congressional recklessness that the public will support Congress’ unique right to appropriate whatever it wants for itself. A firm stand could also help Clinton acquire something he sorely needs: fearful respect on Capitol Hill.

As visions of change dance in Bill Clinton’s head, he should understand that a President can reshape history only by making Congress place national interest above parochial concerns. He can do that only if he possesses a kind of institutional clout the executive now lacks.

If Clinton doesn’t seize back the power to defend his appointees and control the budget, Congress will plow him under. With the economy showing signs of life, the Washington power struggle--The Congress, Stupid--very well could determine Bill Clinton’s domestic legacy.