Clinton Names Rubin to Lead Treasury : Cabinet: The Wall Street veteran is chosen to succeed Secretary Bentsen.

President Clinton, hoping to plug a gap in one of the most successful sectors of his Administration, turned to Wall Street veteran Robert E. Rubin Tuesday to replace Lloyd Bentsen as Treasury secretary.

Clinton announced Bentsen’s resignation, effective Dec. 22, and the selection of Rubin at a ceremony in the White House Rose Garden. Clinton praised the “economic wisdom, common sense and common decency” of the 56-year-old nominee, who served as secretary of the White House National Economic Council, which Clinton created to coordinate economic policy.

Bentsen’s departure is unlikely to shift the Administration’s approach on the economy. He and Rubin share a close relationship with Wall Street and generally have anchored the White House economic policy to more traditional approaches during storms of debate with some of the younger Democrats who filled out the President’s team.

Even so, Rubin will be hard-pressed to match Bentsen’s Washington savvy, acquired during more than two decades in Congress.

“As secretary of the Treasury, his work has touched nearly every field of accomplishment of this Administration, making our economy work again for ordinary Americans,” Clinton said of Bentsen, 73, who plans to return to his home in Houston. “By any stead he ranks as one of the outstanding economic policy-makers in this country since World War II.”

“I’m really going to miss you,” he said to Bentsen.

At the midpoint of his term, Clinton finds himself juggling a series of vacancies or likely vacancies and searching for replacements.

To replace Rubin, Clinton will name Erskine Bowles, deputy chief of the White House staff and former administrator of the Small Business Administration, several Administration sources said. Laura d’Andrea Tyson, the former UC Berkeley economics professor who chairs the President’s Council of Economic Advisers, was said to have wanted the post.

At the same time, Administration sources said, Rubin’s deputy, W. Bowman Cutter, is nearing a decision to resign after a series of unsuccessful turf battles with colleagues.

The President has yet to nominate a replacement for Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy, who has announced his resignation in the wake of criticism that he accepted gifts from firms he regulates. In addition, Clinton is searching for a replacement of his staff secretary, John Podesta.

Until Rubin is confirmed by the Senate, Clinton said, Deputy Treasury Secretary Frank Newman will be acting secretary.

Rumors had circulated for months that Bentsen was planning to resign. He said Tuesday that he told Clinton of his plans in September. But throughout the autumn, as discontent within the Administration has arisen over the operation of the President’s national security team, speculation has been rampant that Clinton would ask Bentsen to replace Warren Christopher as secretary of state. Eventually, Bentsen said, he told Clinton and then Christopher that he was not interested in the position.

Bentsen, who left the Senate two years ago to take the Treasury post, said that he had made up his mind to leave government service this year--at what would have been the end of his fourth Senate term.

While one aide said that Bentsen appeared to be enjoying his job “more than he ever has,” he decided that, if he was to return to the private sector, either as an investor or as the owner of a company, he should move soon because the transition would only get more difficult the longer he waited.

Rubin, former head of the Goldman Sachs & Co. investment firm, developed close ties to Clinton in the 1992 presidential campaign when he matched the then-fledgling presidential candidate with wealthy potential campaign donors.

Rubin is a graduate of Harvard who did postgraduate study at the London School of Economics and received a law degree from Yale. At Goldman Sachs he rose to the rank of co-senior partner and co-chairman. He has a personal fortune estimated at between $100 million and $150 million.

From his office in the West Wing of the White House, just upstairs from the Oval Office, Rubin has often melded disparate approaches and demands of various government officials--ranging from members of Congress reluctant to increase spending to the more liberal members of the President’s economic team, among them Tyson and Labor Secretary Robert B. Reich, who press for a greater federal government role.

Bentsen began his Washington career when he was elected to Congress in 1948 after flying bombing missions over Europe during World War II. He left Washington after four terms, becoming president of a Texas insurance company.

He was elected to the Senate in 1970, defeating George Bush. He ran his own, quickly aborted presidential campaign in 1976 and was vice-presidential running mate to unsuccessful Democratic presidential nominee Michael S. Dukakis in 1988. When chosen by Clinton to become Treasury secretary, Bentsen was chairman of the Senate Finance Committee.

In the Rose Garden ceremony, Bentsen, flanked by his wife, Clinton and Rubin and his wife, assessed the state of the economy after his two years at Treasury: “You couldn’t see the economic flag flying any higher. We’ve got the best numbers that we’ve seen in 30 years.”