The Republicans'

By Nancy Traver/Washington

Moments before House Speaker Jim Wright launched into his resignation speech last week, his nemesis Newt Gingrich was seen merrily whistling through the halls of Congress. When Democrats and then Republicans stood to applaud Wright's denunciation of "mindless cannibalism," Gingrich rose to his feet only grudgingly, hands jammed into his pockets. Afterward, Gingrich, the minority whip and second-ranking Republican in Congress, shunned the crowds of waiting reporters. When he finally did surface, he bristled with his usual attack-dog rhetoric: "Jim Wright is forced out, and he blames the rest of us for his resignation. He has insulted the ethics committee and every decent person in this House."

With Wright's downfall and Tony Coelho's resignation, Gingrich is at his zenith. A year after he first sent the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct sniffing along a well-laid trail of charges against Wright, the Georgia conservative can proudly say he has had a hand in throwing the Democratic leadership of Congress into turmoil. Characteristically, he is not satisfied. "Let's have an honest House, and not one corrupted by the arrogance of power," he says. "I'm out to break the Democratic machine."

Although Republicans are a daunting 184 votes short of a majority in the 435-seat House, Gingrich has his sights trained on a full-fledged G.O.P. takeover. Working with his political soul mate, Republican National Committee Chairman Lee Atwater, he also wants to see his party recapture the Senate, as well as statehouses and city halls all over the nation. But unlike Atwater, whose blues-playing, guitar-strumming sideswipes can be entertaining, Gingrich approaches his mission with a humorless holier-than-thou style that makes him easy to dislike.

His fellow conservatives, however, find him delightful. Says John Buckley, spokesman for the Republican Congressional Committee: "Gingrich is classic agitprop -- great with devising the arguments to forward our revolution. I see him as one-third Thomas Paine, one-third Winston Churchill and one-third Genghis Khan."

The Democrats are responding with threats and name-calling. Wright's son, Jim Wright III, calls Gingrich "another Joe McCarthy." Says Arkansas Congressman Beryl Anthony, who wants Coelho's whip post: "The Republicans should be getting ready to see what this feels like. I think it will be very therapeutic for our members if it dragged out for a while."

Their means of evening the score is a House ethics committee inquiry into Gingrich's finances, focusing on a book deal that is at least as unorthodox as Wright's. When Gingrich co-wrote Window of Opportunity in 1984, he formed a limited partnership and gathered $105,000 from 21 conservative supporters to underwrite the project. Window sold only 12,000 copies, but the lost investments turned into tax write-offs for the backers. Gingrich's wife Marianne was paid a salary of $11,500 for her work in helping establish the partnership. Democrats filed a formal complaint about the book deal with the House ethics committee in April; Common Cause joined in last month, and Gingrich expects the issue to be taken up this week.

Even though he accuses the Democrats of hiring private detectives to trail him, the Capitol Hill equivalent of America's Most Wanted pronounces himself unperturbed: he is used to close scrutiny. In 1984 the magazine Mother Jones published tawdry details of his 1980 divorce from his first wife, Jackie. Hundreds of copies of the story were distributed to House members and reporters on the Hill.

Besides, Gingrich has been spoiling for fights since he arrived in Congress in 1979, outspokenly intent on changing the tone of the Republicans' minority- party congeniality. He repeatedly clashed with Wright's predecessor, Tip O'Neill, and has survived two attempts by the Democratic congressional campaign committee to target him for defeat in his suburban Atlanta district. While he awaits what is sure to be a protracted ethics inquiry, Gingrich will go on fighting. "If we get rid of Wright but keep 99% of the other Democrats, we've accomplished nothing," he says. "I'm ready for more action."