CLINTON SAYS HE'LL STAY UNTIL TERM'S `LAST HOUR'.

Byline: Ann Scales The Boston Globe

President Clinton Saturday vowed to remain in office ``until the last hour of the last day of my term,'' resisting calls for his resignation after becoming only the second U.S. president to be impeached.

Flanked by Democratic congressional leaders and rank-and-file members who descended on the White House after the House approved two articles of impeachment, Clinton said, ``We must stop the politics of personal destruction.''

He said Washington is beginning to look to America like it is ``coming apart.'' One way out of the jam, he said, is for the Senate to work with him in finding a ``reasonable bipartisan and proportionate response'' that is ``constitutional and fair'' and that allows him to stay in office.

Clinton walked out of the White House, with Hillary Rodham Clinton clutching his arm, to applause from dozens of Democratic members of Congress who had gathered behind a small roped-off area on the South Lawn. As Clinton spoke, there were scattered protests from people who oppose the bombing of Iraq and the impeachment of Clinton, as well as those calling for Clinton's resignation.

The calls for his resignation are expected to intensify in the aftermath of Saturday's resignation of the House speaker-designate, Robert L. Livingston, two days after he admitted to having been unfaithful to his wife.

Saying he had ``accepted responsibility for what I did wrong in my personal life,'' Clinton asked: ``The question is what are we going to do now?''

Earlier, after Livingston announced his plan to resign on the floor of the House, Clinton, through his spokesman, Joe Lockhart, joined some Democrats in asking the speaker-designate to reconsider.

``The president firmly believes that the politics of personal destruction in this town and this country has to come to an end, and it has to stop soon,'' Lockhart said.

And in that spirit, he said, ``The president's wish is that Rep. Livingston would reconsider the decision he announced on the floor.'' The quick response was an attempt to blunt any pressure on Clinton to follow Livingston's lead. ``We need to stop playing these kinds of games in Washington,'' Lockhart said, referring to ``this insidious politics of personal destruction.''

In his speech, Clinton made clear he has no intention of resigning.

``I want the American people to know today that I am still committed to working with people of good faith and good will of both parties to do what's best for our country, to bring our nation together, to lift our people up, to move us all forward,'' he said.

He added: ``It's what I've tried to do for six years. It's what I intend to do for two more - until the last hour of the last day of my term.''

Vice President Al Gore said Saturday was ``the saddest day I have seen in our nation's capital.''

He said the House vote to impeach Clinton for perjury and obstruction of justice without allowing a vote on censure ``does a great disservice to a man I believe will be regarded in the history books as one of our greatest presidents. . . . There is no doubt in my mind that the verdict of history will undo the unworthy judgment rendered'' by the House vote, he said.

In an attempt to thwart a party-line vote in the Senate, Clinton implored lawmakers of both political parties to create ``some atmosphere of decency and civility, some presumption of good faith, some sense of proportionality and balance in bringing judgment.''

He said, ``We must get rid of the poisonous venom of excessive partisanship, obsessive animosity and uncontrolled anger.''

As the House voted on the first article of impeachment, a count of perjury, Clinton was in the Oval Office finishing a prayer meeting with his spiritual adviser, the Rev. Tony Campolo, who later described Clinton as being ``tired.''

The president was interrupted by his aides, chief of staff John Podesta and senior adviser Doug Sosnik, who broke the news that the House had voted on the first article of impeachment.

After Campolo left, Clinton watched the vote on the next three articles, two of which failed, with Podesta and Sosnik. They were later joined by the president's new deputy chief of staff, Steve Ricchetti. The four men huddled in the private study off the Oval Office, the same small space where Clinton often met and exchanged gifts with former White House intern Monica S. Lewinsky, the woman whose affair with the president has brought him to impeachment.

Hillary Clinton did not speak after the vote, but she paid an early morning visit to the Capitol, where she received several standing ovations during a closed-door meeting with the House Democratic Caucus.

Several Democrats described the meeting as a pep rally filled with emotion, through which she kept her calm.

They said the first lady told them she watched the House impeachment debate and felt that many members were extraordinarily eloquent in phrasing their explanations of why the offenses charged against her husband were not reasons to impeach him.

Representative Jim Moran, a Democrat from Virginia, said of Hillary Clinton: ``She was both personal but also very much professional in her approach to the caucus.''

Representative Chet Edwards, a Democrat from Texas, quoted the first lady as saying, ``I love and care dearly about my husband.''

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2 Photos

PHOTO (1) President Clinton shakes hands Saturday with House Democrats outside the Oval Office after two articles of impeachment passed.

Doug Mills/Associated Press

(2) President Clinton salutes Democratic members of Congress after a rally at the White House that followed the impeachment vote.

Greg Gibson/Associated Press