HOUSE GOP PUTS OFF, MAY SCRAP TEEN-SMOKING BILL

Politics: Many Republicans no longer fear inaction on the issue will hurt
them come Election Day.

Washington - House Republicans have sidetracked legislation to curtail teen
smoking at least until September, according to congressional officials,
amid internal debate over whether to abandon the measure entirely.

As recently as two weeks ago, Speaker Newt Gingrich told reporters an
anti-smoking bill would be passed by the time lawmakers recess Aug. 5 for a
monthlong break. Key lawmakers were close to agreement on proposed
legislation.

But officials said that by last week, an increasing number of Republicans
had become convinced that the issue had effectively died in the Senate
earlier this year and was rapidly diminishing as an election-year concern
among voters.

At the same time, they said, GOP leaders had so watered don the measure
that Rep. Deborah Pryce, the Ohio Republican who has been chairing a task
force charged with drafting the bill, was expressing discomfort with the
product.

"A growing number of people really want to see what happens" when they
return home and hear from voters, Pryce said Friday.

As for herself, Pryce said, "I'm going to keep pressing the issue when we
return. ... I think teen smoking is a problem and this Congress should take
responsibility" for legislation.

Democrats seized on the development as evidence that Republicans are
beholden to the tobacco industry, which has donated millions to GOP
campaigns in recent years.. "I think the tobacco companies have won the
day," said Laura Nichols, spokeswoman for House Minority Leader Dick
Gephardt, D-Mo. "They don't want to have another round of debate, and
that's reflected in (Republicans') decision not to introduce a bill and
have a debate before we leave for August."

Gingrich spokeswoman Chritina Martin said the GOP leadership will "revisit
the issue when we return" in September.

The draft GOP House bill would rely largely on expanded government
regulation of tobacco manufacturing and advertising as well as a public
advertising campaign and restrictions on vending machines to curb teen
smoking. It includes no tax increases to drive up the cot of cigarettes,
nor provisions to penalize tobacco companies that fail to meet smoking
reduction targets.

Nor does it include any of the protections from lawsuit liability that
tobacco companies favor.

Several Republicans, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that among
top GOP leaders, Gingrich was the strongest advocate of going ahead with
the measure and was under pressure from others to reverse course.

Earlier this year, Republicans worried that the drive by the White House
and Democrats for legislation aimed at reducing teen smoking could cause
them problems this fall.

But in a pitched battle on the Senate floor, a bill to raise the price of
cigarettes by more than $1 a pack died when critics complained it was a
"tax and spend" prescription for the problem of underage smoking.

Since then, numerous public opinion polls have indicated the issue does not
rank high on the list of public concerns in the run up to the election.

Rep. John Linder of Georgia, chairman of the GOP campaign committee and a
participant in House leadership meetings, said he has opposed bringing a
bill to the floor. "The public generally believes ... that tobacco smoking
is voluntary," he said.

Other Republicans take a different position.

At one meeting where the issue was discussed, Rep. Jim Greenwood, R-Pa.,
recalled, "I argued that to do nothing is bad politics, because even though
this issue is not No. 1 on everybody's radar screen, we'd be vulnerable to
attack ads that we are too cozy with tobacco, which is not true."

Further complicating efforts to bring legislation to the floor was a split
within the Republican ranks that makes it difficult to achieve a majority.
Some Republicans favor a tax increase or penalties for tobacco companies
that fail to meet preset smoking reduction guidelines. Others, from tobacco
states, favor little or no government intervention. Few, if any, Democrats
were viewed as likely to join in helping to pass a Republican bill
following Gingrich's rejection earlier this year of a proposed bipartisan
measure.

Gingrich himself has not addressed the issue recently in public.

But as long ago as last January, when Clinton called for a bill to curb
teen smoking as part of his State of the Union address, the speaker said
Republicans would legislate on the issue.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski