Panel Considers Deal on Gingrich Probe : House: Agreement could lead to investigation of the speaker by outside counsel. But Democrats, Republicans argue over scope of inquiry.

After months of deadlocked negotiations, a deal began taking shape Tuesday between Republicans and Democrats on the House Ethics Committee that could lead to an investigation by an outside counsel of the conduct of House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), according to congressional sources.

Committee Chairwoman Nancy L. Johnson (R-Conn.) has proposed having an independent lawyer look into whether Gingrich violated tax laws when his political organizations raised tax-exempt contributions to finance a college course that he taught in suburban Atlanta, said the sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

But Democrats on the committee rejected the plan because it does not include investigating an array of other ethics allegations, including claims that Gingrich misused his office and converted college course materials that were produced with a taxpayer subsidy into his commercial book, “To Renew America.”

“There is no deal,” said one Democratic source. But he added: “This is the most give in five to six months.”

The committee’s five Democrats are concerned that the panel’s five Republicans want to limit the powers of a special counsel--imposing such a tight rein that the investigator could not range beyond the tax question.

One proposal under consideration would allow Republicans to determine the scope of the counsel’s powers while leaving the selection of the independent counsel up to the Democrats, the sources said.

Despite meeting behind closed doors for months, the committee’s Republican and Democratic members have been unable to reach any agreement on how to proceed with the charges filed against Gingrich.

Both sides made some progress Tuesday after revelations last week by the Federal Election Commission that the GOP Action Committee (GOPAC), which Gingrich ran until recently, had violated federal campaign laws by spending $250,000 to help reelect Gingrich in 1990.

The FEC filed suit against GOPAC in federal court and arguments in the case are expected to be heard in February.

No ethics charge has been filed involving the FEC case but House Democratic Whip David E. Bonior (D-Mich.) has said that he intends to file a complaint soon.

The Republicans are not eager to appoint a counsel to investigate allegations of improper fund-raising by GOPAC.

A Democratic source said that negotiations progressed this week as Republicans returned from their districts having heard of their constituents’ concerns about the FEC case against Gingrich and GOPAC.

The ethics complaints against Gingrich also include allegations that he used his prestige as speaker to negotiate a $4.5-million book contract with HarperCollins, a New York publishing firm owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch, who had a number of financial interests in legislation before Congress.

Other complaints are that he used congressional resources to promote the sale of his college lecture tapes, accepted free cable television time to broadcast the course and allowed a GOP political consultant to use his offices.

Also Tuesday, Johnson conceded that she had addressed GOPAC meetings on health care and participated in telephone briefings of candidates backed by the organization but she said that those contacts were not a conflict of interest with her role as chairwoman of the Ethics Committee.

“I believe that for me to have a conflict of interest, I would need to be on the board, need to have organizational responsibilities or need to have some ongoing responsibilities within that organization and I had none of those,” she told reporters as she headed into a closed meeting of her panel.

“My relationship to GOPAC has been as a guest speaker and I consider, therefore, that I have no conflict of interest.”