Acid Raining on Deaver's Parade

By GEORGE J. CHURCH

The title is pompous and a bit puzzling. But when hearings begin Tuesday on the proposed Integrity in Post Employment Act of 1986, there should be little mystery about its true target. The legislation, drafted by South Carolina Republican Senator Strom Thurmond, would bar key federal officeholders from ever lobbying for foreign governments or corporations. It would apply retroactively to anyone who had once served in a Cabinet or sub-Cabinet job, or in one of the 25 top posts on the White House staff. Such as . . . oh, Michael Deaver, for example.

To be sure, Deaver is not the only lobbyist whose business would be gutted. But his activities since he resigned as deputy White House chief of staff last May 10 have raised an unprecedented number of questions about the activities of Washington's influence peddlers. Last week alone:

Senate Democratic Leader Robert Byrd and four other Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee asked Attorney General Edwin Meese to appoint an independent counsel to investigate Deaver's discussions with former colleagues on matters including South Korean trade, tax breaks for Puerto Rico and continued support for Rockwell International's B-l bomber. Within 90 days, Meese must either ask a panel of three Washington judges to name the counsel or explain why he has not done so. Such an explanation could be ticklish, given the close association between Meese and Deaver. During Ronald Reagan's first term, they constituted two-thirds of the unofficial troika of White House officials who wielded power second only to the President's.

David Martin, head of the Government Ethics Office, recommended that the Justice Department investigate Deaver's lobbying contract with the Canadian government. Present law permanently bars a U.S. Government official who "participated personally and substantially" in handling an issue from later lobbying on that same issue. Deaver insists that in the White House he was only tangentially concerned with U.S.-Canadian relations, but others have reported that he helped to choose an envoy to negotiate with Ottawa on acid-rain problems. A Canadian government spokesman denied a Washington Post report that Deaver had begun negotiating to sign up Canada as a lobbying client before he left the White House.

A House subcommittee headed by Michigan Democrat John Dingell planned public hearings on Deaver's activities sometime this month. A House judiciary subcommittee is talking about publicly questioning Deaver and other lobbyists this spring.

Not all the questioning reflects concern about the purity of Government decisions. Some legislators suspect that their efforts to protect American companies from import competition are being foiled by the back-room machinations of lobbyists representing foreign clients.

Publicity seems to be stinging the influence peddlers. Robert Gray, who has lost Angola and Morocco as clients in the past month and laid off a dozen of his lobbying company's 190 employees, was moved last week to write in the New York Times, defending lobbyists as "conduits through which clashing attitudes reach decision makers."

Deaver remains exceptionally well connected: the White House confirmed last week that he still gets a detailed copy of Reagan's daily schedule. In response to questions about Deaver in Los Angeles last Friday, Reagan declared, "I think the whole thing is ridiculous." Nonetheless, all the attention could cost Deaver a bundle. Saatchi & Saatchi, a London advertising and public relations firm, has expressed interest in buying his lobbying organization for as much as $18 million. But the deal has been put on hold, and there are persistent reports that Saatchi has called it off. --By George J. Church. Reported by David Beckwith/Washington

With reporting by David Beckwith/Washington