Clinton and GOP Compete to Steal Limelight on Crime Issue

The federal war on crime may be in danger of being overshadowed by a struggle over which political party is tougher on lawbreakers.

The battle has been touched off by President Clinton, who--in his determination to prove himself a different kind of Democrat--is taking a hard line on crime. It is an issue the Republicans have owned for a generation, and one they can ill afford to lose at a time when other weapons in their ideological arsenal have lost their potency.

Criminal-justice experts contend that this competition has more to do with symbolism than substance--and they warn that whichever side wins, citizens hoping for safer neighborhoods are likely to be disappointed because most of the remedies under debate don’t reach the root causes of crime.

But as analysts point out, symbolism is often decisive in national politics. “The fact of the matter is that politics is a game of perception of reality,” said GOP pollster Anthony Fabrizio. “Polls measure people’s perceptions, and their perceptions become our reality.”

It is easy to see why Clinton’s rhetoric on crime alarms the GOP. Republicans have always had difficulty competing on certain issues, largely those linked to social programs and government activism.

And Republicans contend that Clinton sounds like Democrats have always sounded on such issues. “He is saying: ‘Give us your money and we’ll take care of you,’ ” said conservative Republican leader and 1996 presidential prospect, William J. Bennett. “Republicans cannot win the ‘I can take care of you’ game.”

During the Ronald Reagan Administration, Republicans could depend on the public’s fear of communism and confidence in GOP economic management to build presidential majorities. But the collapse of the Soviet Union and President George Bush’s failure to deal with the recession left crime as one of the few issues on which they could reasonably expect to out-poll the Democrats.

Clinton started taking the issue away during the 1992 campaign. Unlike recent Democratic standard-bearers, the Arkansas governor supported capital punishment--even returning to Little Rock, Ark., in the midst of his presidential campaign to oversee an execution.

But his most dramatic bid to seize the issue came in his State of the Union Address last week.

Most notable was Clinton’s endorsement of the “three-strikes-and-you’re-out” idea embodied in the crime bill passed by the Senate last year. Clinton specifically backed life sentences for criminals convicted of three violent crimes.

The crime bill--which has an uncertain future in the House--would authorize $22.5 billion over five years to fight crime. It includes money for a host of projects, including $6 billion for construction of prisons and military-style boot camps for criminals; almost $8 billion to help communities put 100,000 more police officers on the streets; and more than $8 billion in social and crime-prevention programs, such as drug treatment for prisoners.

Stung by Clinton, the Republicans struck back. Led by Senate GOP leader Bob Dole of Kansas and Rep. Newt Gingrich of Georgia, the House Republican whip, 10 GOP lawmakers used a Capitol Hill press conference to accuse Clinton of being unwilling to back up his tough talk on crime with money and action.

“A Ronald Reagan speech, Jimmy Carter details,” said Florida Sen. Connie Mack. And Texas Sen. Phil Gramm claimed that Clinton’s budget proposals last year cut funding for prison construction by $580 million.

But some criminal-justice experts say both parties are deluding the public by promoting superficial solutions to a complex problem that is caused in large part by fundamental weaknesses in society.

“You must deal with prevention or you will drown in enforcement,” said Donald E. Santarelli, who headed the Federal Law Enforcement Assistance Administration under President Richard Nixon and is now chairman of the National Committee on Community Corrections, a nonpartisan group working to link the correctional system more closely to local communities.