GOP DEFECTIONS GROW; CENSURE EFFORT FAILING; ARTICLES MAY NOT GET SIMPLE MAJORITY.

Byline: Eric Schmitt The New York Times

As the Senate privately debated for a second day whether to remove President Clinton from office, Republican support for conviction began cracking, and an effort to censure the president had virtually died.

Three Republican moderates, Sens. James Jeffords of Vermont, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania and John Chafee of Rhode Island, said they would oppose both the perjury and obstruction of justice charges. Two other Republicans said they would vote for obstruction but against the perjury charge, all but assuring that the perjury article would not receive a simple majority of 51 votes.

Jeffords said the president obstructed justice but that it did not rise to a removable offense. The senator predicted that as many as six other Republicans would vote against both charges, a forecast that if correct would mean the article on obstruction also could fail to get a majority, much less the 67 votes required for conviction.

Jeffords said he tried in his speech on the floor of the Senate on Wednesday to persuade his Republican colleagues not to buckle to pressure to convict the president. ``I wanted to assure some people who were on the edge that it would be important to make sure that we don't set a precedent.''

At least two other Senate Republicans, Ted Stevens of Alaska and Slade Gorton of Washington, have said they will vote for the obstruction of justice count, but not the perjury charge.

At midday, after some of the Republican defections were known, Sen. Trent Lott, the majority leader, issued a terse, cryptic statement that did not announce how he would vote. With his aides insisting that Lott was not trying to influence votes, the statement acknowledged: ``The evidence shows that the president has committed perjury and obstructed justice. The only question left is, will the Senate vote to find him guilty of these high crimes.''

Although Lott said at another point Wednesday that, if at all possible, the Senate would hold the final votes by 5 p.m. today, a top Republican aide said Wednesday night that it was increasingly likely that the final votes would come Friday.

Attacking Starr

By day's end, about 50 senators had walked to the well of the chamber to explain their views, with Democrats more outspoken than Republicans. A common Democratic theme was attacking Kenneth Starr, the independent counsel, and the House prosecutors, a refrain senators repeated in the corridors and in news conferences.

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, denounced the case as ``one of the most blatant political vindictive actions taken by the House of Representatives since Andrew Johnson's case was pushed through by the radical Republicans of his time and forced upon the Senate.''

With Clinton's acquittal fairly certain, senators allotted 15 minutes each spoke to a chamber cleared of reporters and spectators, offering their arguments in impassioned and prosaic speeches of why the president should be convicted and expelled, or exonerated of the crimes leveled against him.

In Wednesday's session of 6-1/2 hours, senators delivered a steady stream of speeches but rarely engaged in real deliberations. Even Lott, who favored closing the Senate's doors to encourage a lively give-and-take in the first presidential impeachment trial in 131 years, conceded at midday that that had not happened.

``At some point deliberations may break out, kind of like smallpox,'' Lott said with a chuckle. ``If we have 100 speeches without a lot of exchanges, that's OK, too.''

Orderly speeches

Senators said those speeches were orderly, and the tone inside the chamber was serious, even grave at times. Party warfare seemed to abate. ``The sharp partisan divisions that are evident in open debate are not nearly as evident behind closed doors,'' said Sen. Robert Torricelli, D-N.J., one of his party's fiercest partisans.

Among those speaking Wednesday were Sens. James Inhofe of Oklahoma, Conrad Burns of Montana, Jim Bunning of Kentucky and Richard Shelby of Alabama, all Republicans; and Sens. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York, John Breaux of Louisiana, and Barbara Mikulski of Maryland, all Democrats.

But they did not confine their comments to the closed chamber. Just hours after Lott implored senators Wednesday morning to honor their oath of secrecy and not make floor statements public before the final votes, Harkin left the chamber to read to reporters the remarks he planned to make later in the day.

Announcing, as expected, that he would oppose both articles, Harkin blasted the House prosecutors. ``Where the political motivation is so blatant, as it has been in this case, I think we in the Senate should have our guard up on what this case is about.''

Angered by what he viewed as Harkin's grandstanding and breaking Senate rules on publicizing floor remarks, Lott rushed to microphones off the Senate floor to criticize Harkin's comments as ``inappropriate.''

Harkin's aides said the senator, a fierce critic of the closed deliberations, had not violated Senate ethics rules. They cited a memorandum from Lott's staff that said it was permissible for senators to read their statements in public before delivering them in closed session.

By late afternoon, a growing number of senators paraded before the cameras or released statements altered slightly from the comments they intended to give in the closed session.

`Not proven'

Specter, who handed out a 27-page statement, said the House prosecutors were unfairly handicapped by the Senate's refusal to hear testimony from any live witnesses. As a result, Specter, citing Scottish law, said he will cast a vote of ``not proven,'' instead of guilty, not guilty or present.

Led by Harkin, virtually all of the Senate Democrats who issued statements Wednesday criticized what they said was the overzealous and politically motivated crusades by Starr and the House prosecutors, who based their case on Starr's report.

``They repeatedly rely on inferences while ignoring direct testimony to the contrary,'' said Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich. ``They omit key materials which contradict their charges. And they contain serious misstatements of key facts.''

Even mild-mannered Sen. Daniel Akaka, D-Hawaii, perhaps the most anonymous member of the Senate, lashed out at the House, saying, ``The partisan nature of the House action invites challenges to its legitimacy.''

Senators who say they will vote to convict Clinton on both counts were less vocal Wednesday. Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, a moderate Republican whose comments are usually measured, was uncharacteristically acid in his assessment of the president: ``The crimes committed here demonstrate that he is capable of lying routinely whenever it is convenient. He is not trustworthy.''

As the impeachment deliberations meandered on behind closed doors, supporters of rebuking Clinton virtually conceded that Republican opposition, including a threatened filibuster, had doomed their efforts to bring such a measure to the Senate floor for a vote before a holiday recess begins this weekend.

``Censure is on life support, gasping for breath,'' said Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who favors that action.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., said Democrats would push for a test vote on a draft censure after the final impeachment votes. If that motion fails to win the necessary 67 votes, she said she might draft a statement condemning the president's behavior and circulate it for senators to sign.

``This thing has gone up and down,'' said Feinstein. ``We will get enough signatures and sponsors to show that this is a serious document. One way or another, this is going to see the light of day.''

White House aides are debating whether and how Clinton should react to the Senate votes, once they are taken. They are considering several options, from a brief written statement to an Oval Office address.

Clinton's aides are particularly concerned about the tone that he would take in a statement, since many senators have warned that they would take a dim view of any gloating. No matter what the president says, some aides said, he will be criticized as celebrating the outcome of this 13-month ordeal.

WHAT'S NEXT

Here is what's ahead as the Senate continues to consider the case for removing William Jefferson Clinton from the presidency:

TODAY: The Senate is expected to continue its closed-door deliberations on the articles of impeachment. Separate votes on the articles could occur. The votes would be by roll call and would be made in public. Two-thirds, or 67, of the senators would have to vote guilty on at least one article to convict the president and remove him from office.

FRIDAY: If deliberations do not end until late Thursday or if some senators still wish to be heard, the Senate could vote on the articles of impeachment today. The Senate would vote to adjourn the trial. Adjournment requires a simple majority.

Knight Ridder Newspapers

CAPTION(S):

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Chart: (1 -- 4) Clinton job approval

Ratings since the scandal broke last year

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