CLINTON ENTERS FIGHT OVER U.S. LAND IN UTAH.

Byline: Timothy Egan The New York Times

Following a path taken by Teddy Roosevelt in 1908, President Clinton will go to the Grand Canyon on Wednesday, where he is expected to declare as a national monument a big stretch of much-fought-over federal land in southern Utah.

If he does establish a 1.8 million-acre Canyons of the Escalante National Monument in the red rock country of Utah, the president would settle with a stroke of a pen one of the last big wilderness fights in the contiguous United States. But such a move also would block the development of the largest known coal reserves in the nation: an underground bank of nearly seven billion tons of coal worth up to a trillion dollars.

White House aides say the president has yet to make a decision. But others within in the administration, as well some members of the Utah congressional delegation, say all signs point to the likelihood that Clinton will declare the area a national monument. He does not need congressional approval to do so.

Although the entire Utah delegation opposes closing such a large area to development, the move could provide Clinton with an election year bonus. Polls have shown broad political support for creation of a large wilderness area in southern Utah.

Utah, the most Republican state in the nation - Clinton finished third there, behind Ross Perot in 1992 - is not considered within reach of Clinton no matter what he does. Creating a big new monument in the red rock country would be popular in the rest of the West, White House aides say.

In a meeting Saturday with Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said, he told Babbitt that if the monument was created, ``There would be real hell to pay.''

A Utah congressman who is chairman of the House committee overseeing national parks, Rep. James Hansen, a Republican, said, ``If this goes through, I will go to the House and blast Clinton every night before national television cameras. I want people to see the biggest land grab in the nation.''

The president, with Vice President Al Gore, is scheduled to go to the Grand Canyon on Wednesday, near the very spot where Roosevelt stood when he declared the area an 800,000-acre national monument in 1908. At the time, mining interests held claims to the canyon, now one of the most popular national parks in the world.