A MAN OF CHOICE

By JOHN F. DICKERSON/ PHOENIX

WHEN ARLEN SPECTER WAS INTRODUCED at Iowa's state G.O.P. convention last June as Anita Hill's chief inquisitor, the crowd cheered. When he started talking about the intolerance taking over their party, however, they shifted in their seats. When he talked about the necessary division between church and state, they booed.

He was inspired. "I didn't make the strong push to run until I was booed in Iowa," says the Pennsylvania Senator. He was convinced by that rebuke that the social extremism that had so disturbed him during the 1992 G.O.P. convention had taken control of the party. His candidacy would offer an alternative. "America needs to be governed from the center," he says. Specter offers a mix of fiscal conservatism and social libertarianism. He is the party's lone pro-choice candidate and speaks out against government's imposing religious values. Opponents claim that by calling for the removal of the antiabortion plank from the party platform, he is exacerbating old wounds at the expense of the party. Specter claims the opposite: that keeping the provision divides the party by shutting out pro-choice members. On domestic and fiscal issues, Specter's conservative critics have less room for complaint. As a former district attorney of Philadelphia, crime control has always been his passion. "Arlen convinced us that we were the only ones fighting for the people," recalls Ed Rendell, his former assistant and now mayor of Philadelphia. "He convinced us we were the guardians at the gates of hell." Specter would abolish plea bargains and mandate life sentences for career criminals.

Most Americans know the three-term Senator for his zealous questioning of Anita Hill during the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings. It is a complicated political legacy. While conservatives applauded him, others were disturbed that his 1992 Senate opponent's most potent attack ads were of Specter at those hearings. Those who know him say the hearings took their toll. "He looked like he had been beaten by a stick," says his senior adviser Ed Howard, recalling a meeting the two had after the hearings. "He said, 'Ed, I think I've lost every friend I have.'" Though he has a strong record on women's issues, he admits the experience is a political liability.

Specter's tactical strategy is to allow the other hopefuls to split the conservative bloc while he holds on to the more moderate voters, including those who say they are pro-choice. It is a long shot, but one he can put into perspective: 20 months ago, doctors told him that a brain tumor would probably kill him in three to six weeks. "You want to do a little more," he says of his outlook after the operation, in which the tumor was removed and found to be benign. "Taking on a presidential run is a very big step ... But I really want to use these days in as meaningful a way as I can."

--By John F. Dickerson/Phoenix