Rallies Give Voice to Supporting Actors and Opposing Citizens

Barbra Streisand and Jack Nicholson rallied to President Clinton’s defense Wednesday, but what the president really needs are members of Congress like Stephen Horn.

Across California and around the country, Clinton’s friends and foes staged rallies and prayer vigils--pro and con--on impeachment in a final push to sway undecided members of Congress.

Although Clinton’s Hollywood friends drew the crowds, a handful of undecided members of Congress, such as Republican Horn of Long Beach, celebrities of the moment, hold key votes on impeachment.

In West Los Angeles, more than 1,000 anti-impeachment demonstrators gathered on a December day with weather in the 80s to hear Streisand, Nicholson and other Clinton supporters, including brother Roger Clinton, and to wave placards reading “Watergate, Iran-Contra and Monica?” and “He lied about sex. So what?”

In San Diego, debates broke out in Balboa Park among 300 demonstrators--almost evenly divided between Clinton supporters carrying signs reading “The right is wrong” and Clinton opponents flashing signs reading “Impeach the perjurer” and “It’s the felonies, stupid.” Both sides waved American flags.

The demonstrations stretched coast to coast, from Charlotte, N.C., where hundreds gathered in a church for a prayer vigil in support of Clinton, to San Francisco, Sacramento and the offices of several California Republican Congress members, including Horn’s.

Streisand Says She’s ‘Stupefied’ by Process

In Los Angeles, Streisand, making a rare public appearance, told a crowd outside the federal building that she is “stupefied” by the impeachment proceedings.

“Who could have imagined that we would be living in a time when those we elected to office would turn their backs on the public and ignore the voices of the American people?” she asked. “While we believe the president’s behavior may deserve censure, in no way do these charges rise to the standard for impeachment.”

Nicholson, while joking that many actors have played presidents, cautioned that the impeachment crisis is not entertainment,even though the rally was covered by TV’s “Entertainment Tonight.”

“We live in a television age. We’re going to always live in a television age. These things regrettably sell a lot of soap,” he said. “We can’t confuse these issues.”

Without mentioning Clinton’s behavior or Monica S. Lewinsky, Nicholson observed: “We’re kind of a strange country; we’re Puritan-formed about sexuality.”

The rally, held under a red, white and blue banner reading “Listen to the people. Stop impeachment now,” was sponsored by the People for the American Way and the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow Coalition. It included banners of the United Farm Workers Union, the National Organization for Women and the American Civil Liberties Union.

In Compton, an anti-impeachment rally at City Hall drew more than 100 people, including 79-year-old Caffie Greene of Lynwood.

Greene, an Arkansas native who planned to travel to Washington with 20 other members of Concerned Black Women to protest the impeachment, said of Clinton: “I know his track record. He was available for all of us.”

“We knew how important it was going to be to support the person who has been supporting us all along,” said Fred Cressel, mayor pro-tem of Compton. The heavily minority city passed a resolution in October supporting Clinton and complaining that $40 million spent on independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr’s investigation could have been used to create 5,714 jobs paying $8.50 per hour.

Fears of Federal Inaction

A lengthy impeachment trial would hit communities like Compton the hardest, said Compton City Councilwoman Delores Zurita. “I for one do not believe that Compton can afford the luxury of two years of inaction from our federal legislators that would surely be the result of an impeachment trial.”

In Orange County, youth minister Steven Gooden of Newport Beach was planning to hold a prayer vigil today to pray for Clinton to resign.

“The only way of getting this man out of office at this point is divine intervention,” said Gooden, chairman of No Compromise Inc., a conservative group that deals with moral issues confronting youth.

Gooden said there is biblical precedent for praying for the president’s resignation. He cited a passage from the Book of Samuel: “Fall down on your sword, for those who walk in pride will be brought down.”

About 50 Orange County Democrats were staging their own rally in support of Clinton outside Republican Rep. Edward R. Royce’s Fullerton office. They urged passing motorists to honk in support of the president, and many did.

“I was desperate to shout,” said Sallie Wald, 50, of Fullerton. “I got tired of sitting at home and hearing that there’s no outrage among the American people. I am outraged, and this is better than screaming at my TV set.”

A spokesman for Royce, who was in Washington and is pro-impeachment, responded: “The congressman appreciates hearing from everybody.”

Orange County Democratic officials said they are using the rallies to vent their frustration at being unable to get in touch with members of the Judiciary Committee or other legislators. The voice mailboxes of committee Chairman Henry J. Hyde and House Speaker-designate Bob Livingston (R-La.) have been full since last week, callers to the county’s Democratic Party headquarters have reported.

“People are absolutely as frustrated as I’ve ever seen,” said Jeanne Costales, Orange County chairwoman of the Democratic Party.

Democrats planned to conduct a prayer vigil today outside Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher’s Huntington Beach office--at the same time a vigil is planned in Washington led by Jackson. And another demonstration was planned outside Horn’s district office.

Costales said the Orange County Democratic headquarters got 200 phone calls Monday and hundreds more since then, including some from Republicans seeking to change their party affiliation in protest of the impeachment proceedings.

In San Diego, Rep. Bob Filner and San Diego City Council members Christine Kehoe and George Stevens, all Democrats, urged the public to phone, petition or otherwise pressure Republican Congress members to opt for censure rather than impeachment.

“We can forgive the president because he has asked to be forgiven,” said Stevens, an ordained minister. “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”

In Sacramento, about 40 Clinton supporters rallied on the steps of the state Capitol. While siding with the president on impeachment, some of the protesters criticized Clinton’s order to attack Iraq, chanting, “Bread, not bombs.”

But while Washington was riveted on the impeachment proceedings, in Los Angeles, which ranks its spectacles by the number of tickets they sell, impeachment was just one thing on the minds of residents, who were dealing with the arrival of killer bees and long lines to buy a Furby, a hot-selling Christmas toy.

Not everybody is getting involved in the impeachment controversy.

Two members of a group calling itself the Committee Against Impeachment Nightmare urged the Burbank City Council to pass a resolution opposing impeachment Tuesday night.

But Burbank Mayor Dave Golonski was not receptive to the idea. “The whole impeachment process has become far too political. . . . I don’t think that would be an appropriate thing to do as a city.”

Contributing to this story were Times staff writers Tony Perry in San Diego, David Haldane in Orange County, Carl Ingram and Nancy Hill-Holtzman in Sacramento, Maria L. La Ganga in San Francisco, Seema Mehta, Solomon Moore, Art Marroquin and Jack Leonard in Los Angeles.