Gingrich Speech Debuts His Kinder, Gentler Side

When President Clinton delivered his first State of the Union Address two years ago, Newt Gingrich was a back-bench member of Congress who sat quietly amid the lawmakers who had come to hear the President outline his vision for the future.

On Wednesday, Gingrich ascended to the top tier of the rostrum to become the first Republican Speaker of the House in 40 years. And now it was time for the combative former history professor to outline his own vision for the future--one that in its broadest outlines is remarkably similar to Clinton’s, even if the two men have very different road maps for arriving at the destination.

Although a critic might have characterized his speech as meandering and even a bit maudlin at times, it was clearly a kinder and gentler Newt who stood where Clinton had two years before and who spoke about being “overwhelmed” by the historic responsibility of the role now thrust upon him.

There was none of the fiery partisan street fighter in his admonition to members of his own party that they could not say they believed “in the Good Samaritan . . . (while) walking by a fellow American who’s hurt and not do something.”

But it was also vintage Gingrich as the new Speaker outlined his vision of the nation, which he hopes Republicans will create through their 10-point “contract with America”--a nation of safer streets, job opportunities for all and a newfound spirituality and respect for the law.

Earlier, Gingrich acknowledged that he has some growing to do if he is to manage his new responsibilities as Speaker successfully.

Whether the fiery chief architect of the Republicans’ electoral victory last November can make the transition from partisan guerrilla fighter and bomb thrower to leader of the GOP’s new majority remains an unanswered question.

Clearly, his Democratic detractors hope that he will impale himself on the points of his own sharp rhetoric sometime between today and the 1996 elections.

But while most analysts cautioned that it is too early to make predictions, their consensus--based on his opening day performance--was that he is off to a good start.

And if there was any doubt that the center of political gravity had shifted overnight in Washington, it was dispelled by the adulation that his joyous GOP colleagues showered upon him as he walked down the center aisle of the crowded House chamber, a copy of “The Portable Abraham Lincoln” under one arm and an oversize gavel made from a freshly fallen Georgia walnut tree under the other.

“Newt Gingrich, right now, has two things that President Clinton doesn’t, . . . a mandate and an agenda,” said William Schneider, a political analyst with the American Enterprise Institute. “He now controls the agenda in American politics, and the proof is that the press is already treating him as the new President.”

Rutgers University political scientist Ross K. Baker, characterized Gingrich’s speech as “almost an inaugural address, . . . conciliatory, high-minded and philosophical in tone.”

The speech was “Newt’s way of offering an olive branch to the other side, of saying that he’s ready to stop putting bombs in political suitcases and work with Democrats in a responsible fashion as leader of the majority,” added a senior GOP aide.

It was indeed a kinder and gentler version of the man the Democrats referred to this holiday season as the “Gingrich Who Stole Christmas.”

Looking in their direction from the rostrum, he spoke with convincing compassion of the plight of America’s poor and the “new partnership” he hopes to forge with his liberal critics in fashioning new solutions to help the underprivileged.

Gingrich knows “that he has an image problem” and he tried to use the speech to address concerns that he is “too radical and uncompassionate. . . . He was trying to say that conservatism can have a human face,” said Mark Rozell, a political scientist at Mary Washington College in Fredricksburg, Va.

“The most important message he tried to convey in the speech,” said Schneider, “was that he recognizes that this country has a lot of social problems and that the way to solve them is through different solutions with less government. . . . The message was not that we must turn back government but that we can solve these problems with less government.”

But if it was a new Newt who materialized on the first day of the Republican revolution on Capitol Hill, the old Newt was never far behind. After acknowledging to a news conference earlier in the day that he was trying “to change my style somewhat” by being less “destructive” in the words he utters, Gingrich responded to questions about a floor challenge by blasting the Democrats’ “cheap and nasty” tactics for trying to force an early vote on a ban on gifts from lobbyists, a proposal that he opposes.

“Newt’s temper and his propensity for shooting indiscriminately from the mouth are liabilities he will have to learn to control better than he has,” a GOP colleague acknowledged. “But even if he makes a lot of mistakes, his strength is in his ability to learn quickly from them. He’s better on the rebound than even Bill Clinton is,” the lawmaker added.

Other risks abound, however. And those seeking to divine the kind of leader Gingrich will be found his performance on his first day in office less illuminating than his behind-the-scenes maneuvering in the weeks before.

Moving quickly to consolidate his influence in the aftermath of the Nov. 8 elections, Gingrich already has served notice that he intends to concentrate authority in his office and be the most powerful Speaker in recent times.

That goal has already created resentment among some senior members of his party, however, as well as a growing unease over the consequences of tying the party’s fortunes too closely to Gingrich’s personal fate.

“The risk is that, because Gingrich personifies the new Republican majority right now, the success or failure of the party will rise or fall with him,” said Schneider, adding that the new Speaker’s oversized prominence and penchant for stirring controversy “make him an inviting target for those who would destroy his credibility.”

But for the moment at least, few Republicans were voicing such concerns, while most Democrats, trying hard to disguise their disappointment, were saving their criticisms for another time.