'TIS THE SEASON TO BOYCOTT CHINESE GOODS.

Byline: A.M. Rosenthal

IN central Indiana, a conservative Republican member of Congress is proposing to his constituents an answer to a question constantly put to themselves by Americans horrified by the ever-increasing oppression through which the Communist Chinese government rules its own country and occupied Tibet.

These Americans are troubled that their country contributes heavily to the oppression. They know that their government without anesthesia amputated human rights from its China agenda in favor of more trade - though it is the Chinese bottom line that profits, not the American.

They know that American companies, by tailoring their mouths, minds and actions to obey Beijing, become voluntary prisoners and servitors of the Chinese Communists. They know that the profits of Chinese goods sold in the United States, and the benefits of American investments, go in substantial part directly to the Chinese army, police and Politburo. They know those profits help the Chinese Communists build and sell missiles and weapon technologies to other dictatorships, open enemies of the United States.

But facing China's power and the new overarching value of American policy - trade uber alles - they ask what can any one American or American family do?

The answer that Rep. Dan Burton is giving his constituents is: Boycott Chinese products. Do it now during this holiday buying season, and keep it up when it is over. Send the message that at least in Indiana, Americans have had enough of China's abuses of human rights and will not contribute their own money to those who commit them.

Burton shames members of Congress, conservative or liberal, who followed or encouraged President Clinton in abandoning human rights. It is a phrase easy to define - the right to speak, organize, worship, protest and write without fear of arrest, years of torture and slave labor, or murder.

Burton is not alone. Around the country, young people in almost 300 colleges and high schools are joining with Students for a Free Tibet to boycott Chinese goods. Musicians, actors, painters are joining in - the kind of people who can reach other Americans.

The students and artists are not naive, nor is Burton. They know that the Chinese economy will not crumble - that is not their goal. They know that American businesses in China will not become human rights monitors.

They know that Beijing will light nationalist fires by saying the boycott sanctions are aimed at the people - exactly as Saddam Hussein says of the restrictions against him, as so many Westerners said of the anti-apartheid boycotts.

Beijing will scream hysterically because it knows that boycotts and disinvestment have two powers. Though they start small, they grow and can force governments to make at least some reforms - less time on the rack, a looser muzzle maybe.

And they are a powerful way of spreading awareness of a cause that would otherwise die of malignant official neglect.

The boycotters have an obligation not to do it silently. Look at the label on the dress or the toy and when you put it down, tell the clerk or manager. Speak up in the store as disinvestors should at stockholder meetings.

For many Americans, there is a strong religious motivation. Harry Wu, who spent 19 years in a Chinese slave-labor camp and struggles for those still there, wrote to Burton that the Communists were cracking down harder than ever on Chinese who would not renounce their church.

``That China can benefit from the celebration of Christ's birth while at the same time persecute Chinese Christians is criminal,'' he said.

In the magazine U.S. Catholic, Donna S. Fernandez wrote about how as Catholics she and her husband decided not to buy anything China-made and to explain to their son why he could not have toys from China.

She found wisdom in the Book of Proverbs: ``Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it.'' For courage in setting out on the path, she turned to a Chinese saying: ``The journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step.''

And from the General Epistle of James she quotes 1:22: ``Be ye doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.''