TERROR IN OKLAHOMA CITY : Rule Changes Limit FBI’s Infiltration of Extremists : Surveillance: Clinton, others see need to rethink ban against spying on domestic groups without evidence pointing toward violence, illegal acts.

If federal officials operated today under the rules that existed 25 years ago, they might well have tapped the phones and even infiltrated the ranks of violence-prone extremists such as those now suspected of responsibility for the Oklahoma City bombing.

In the mid-1970s, however, embarrassed by revelations that FBI agents under Director J. Edgar Hoover had penetrated anti-Vietnam war groups and spied on Martin Luther King Jr., the Justice Department barred such forms of surveillance without specific evidence pointing toward likely violence or illegal acts.

That prohibition is likely to be rethought, however, now that evidence has pointed toward individuals with alleged links to a home-grown, right-wing paramilitary group as being responsible for the bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, the nation’s worst act of domestic terrorism.

“What this exposes is that the United States is a soft target for terrorist groups,” said Richard K. Willard, a former Ronald Reagan Administration official who specialized in security issues. “There’s been a climate of concern about the FBI disrupting groups that may not be terrorists, but the problem is that you don’t know in advance which ones will carry out their threats.”

President Clinton, while avoiding drawing conclusions about a fast-changing story, said Friday that the entire incident would prompt the government to re-examine “the sufficiency of our efforts in the whole area of terrorism.”

For the last 25 years, the government has focused most of its attention on international terrorists who might strike in this country instead of domestic groups.

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Under the law, federal officials have broad latitude to investigate and wiretap aliens who are believed to be part of international terrorist groups. Officials can go to a secret court and get long-term warrants to tap the phones of non-citizens who are linked to known terrorist groups.

“But when you’re talking about domestic surveillance, there is a standard of probable cause,” said Georgetown University law professor David D. Cole. A magistrate must be convinced that a group member is probably engaged in criminal activity, he said, and reports of violent talk about the federal officials is probably not enough to justify aggressive surveillance.

That constitutional restriction, which was simply ignored in the Hoover era, prevents the bureau from closely monitoring the activities of potential domestic terrorists, law enforcement experts said.

Cole said legal restrictions are proper and needed to protect constitutional rights.

“The fact that there are some bad domestic organizations is not reason to say we should let the government intrude broadly into domestic groups,” Cole said.

Some extremist hate groups have not been put under surveillance because there is no evidence they will go beyond violent rhetoric to engage in real violence, many experts said. A former House staff director who oversaw the FBI argued that the government’s hands are not tied by the law. The real problem, he said, is the practical one of keeping track of thousands of extremist groups, a few of which might engage in violence.

“The challenge is sifting through the vast flow of information that comes into them and deciding which groups are going to do something serious,” said James K. Dempsey, deputy director of the Center for National Security Studies.

“They keep track of all of the anti-abortion groups, but they don’t know which ones are going to get involved in killing. Then there are the extreme animal rights groups, the ecological activists, the Puerto Rican groups. When I was on the (House Judiciary) Committee, we saw long lists of groups that were under investigation, and the white supremacist groups were always on it,” said Dempsey, who was an aide to former Rep. Don Edwards.

But others who are concerned about radical white supremacists said the government has not done enough to track potentially dangerous hate groups.

Morris Dees, the director of the Southern Poverty Law Center, told CNN Friday that his organization regularly gathers materials about white supremacists, including newsletters and newspapers in which leaders spout threats against the government and rant about blacks, Jews and liberals.

“I’ve been frustrated that we can’t get more cooperation from the Justice Department and the FBI,” Dees said, contending that agents’ hands are tied by legal restrictions on domestic surveillance.

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Even if the FBI had kept a file of information on the paramilitary organizations to which the suspected Oklahoma bombers have been linked, its agents could not have obtained a warrant to tap their phones without clear evidence of criminal wrongdoing.

Significantly, however, neither Congress nor the Supreme Court has acted to limit the investigative authority of the FBI involving domestic organizations. The 1976 guidelines on domestic surveillance were put into effect by then-Atty. Gen. Edward Levi, and they could be revised on the authority of current Atty. Gen. Janet Reno.

Willard, the former Reagan Administration official, said the government may need to expand its domestic surveillance to cope with a new threat.

“We cannot tolerate this kind of terrorist activity,” he said. “We’ve been fortunate in the last 20 years that domestic terrorism hasn’t been much of a problem. But you have to fit the authority to the nature of the problem. And we may now need a much more aggressive policy to investigate and to dispute these domestic terror groups.”

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Targeting the U.S.

All sorts of facilities have fallen victim to bombing incidents during the last several years. List shows the totals for 1989 through 1993.

Target Deaths Injuries Property Damage (in hundreds of thousands) Residential 74 473 $93 Commercial 13 1,290 5,289 Vehicles 28 139 31 Educational 0 169 18.3 Mailboxes 0 26 1.9 Open areas 15 214 0.8 Utilities 0 2 32.1 Law enforcement 1 21 3.8 State/Local government 1 5 17.2 Federal government 1 8 47.3 Banks 0 4 18.1 Military 0 3 0.8 Airports/aircraft 0 0 2.9 Apartments * 8 52 22.8 Religious facilities * 0 0 0 Energy facilities * 0 0 0.3 Parks * 2 4 0.2 Medical facilities 0 0 3.2 Other 14 64 28.2 Total 157 2,474 $5,610.9

* Added in 1992.

Source: 1993 Explosives Report; Researched by VICKY McCARGAR / Los Angeles Times