Barbour Elected Chief of a Divided GOP

ST. LOUIS — Republican officials elected a former aide to Ronald Reagan as their new party leader Friday but remained mired in disarray, dividing over a call by departing chairman Richard N. Bond for the party to dispense with anti-abortion planks and other social “litmus tests.”

Haley Barbour, 45, is a Mississippi lawyer who served as Reagan’s director of political affairs. He left the White House to form a private consulting and lobbying firm. Barbour was selected as chairman of the 165-member Republican National Committee after two of his four rivals for the party leadership post withdrew.

Barbour won with a 90-vote majority on the third ballot, outdistancing his nearest rival, Michigan conservative Spencer Abraham, by 33 votes. Two other opponents for the job, departing Missouri Gov. John Ashcroft and Oregon party leader Craig Berkman, dropped out after the second ballot, and most of their supporters defected to Barbour. Former Army Secretary Howard H. (Bo) Calloway had 19 votes.

Barbour pledged to committee members after the vote that he would work to renew the party’s atrophied local and state organizations and told the party loyalists gathered in a Hyatt Regency hotel ballroom that they should “project that we’re the party of inclusion, which we are.”

Throughout the second day of the party’s first major gathering since former President George Bush lost his reelection bid last November, ranking party stalwarts emphasized that Republicans needed to project a “big tent” image to the nation.

Although neither Barbour nor Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.), who also spoke to the RNC, elaborated on their calls for inclusion, the inference was clear to most committee members.

“We don’t want to repeat Houston,” said Phyllis Acklie, the wife of Nebraska committeeman Duane Acklie. Her reference was to the widespread notion that the Bush campaign was crippled by its catering to social conservatives during last year’s national convention in Houston.

RNC members remained divided over the steps they need to take to erect their tent. In his last speech as RNC chairman, Bond, who was criticized for the way he ran the Houston convention, offered a frank admission of mistakes and urged the party to soften its rigid opposition to abortion, gay rights and other issues dear to social conservatives.

“I’ve done a lot of soul searching,” Bond said, adding: “Our job is not to administer litmus tests on any issue or to be the champions of any single cause.”

Bond’s speech, which also included a sharp jab at former Bush rival Patrick J. Buchanan for sneering at “those of us who regret the intolerance at times associated with our party,” won a standing ovation from committee members.

“Someone in his position needed to stand up and say it,” said Ann W. Stone, who is not a member of the RNC but is head of Republicans for Choice--a faction that supports abortion rights and was spurned during last year’s convention. “This party needs to follow his advice.”

But other party conservatives rejected Bond’s appeal. Texas national committee chairman Ernest Angelo Jr. termed the speech “a mistake.”

And anti-abortion activist Phyllis Schlafly, who is not an RNC member, reacted in cold fury, blinking and shaking her head in bewilderment as she learned of Bond’s statement.

“I simply find it difficult to understand,” she said. “By softening our abortion plank, we’d lose all the Reagan Democrats.” Schlafly added angrily that “it’s generally agreed the Bush campaign was one of the most badly run in a long time. We don’t need any advice from the losers.”

Profile: Haley Barbour

Age: 45

Education: Graduated from University of Mississippi law school, 1973

Experience: Veteran of Republican campaigns dating to the 1960s; ran unsuccessfully for U.S. Senate in 1982. Elected to Republican National Committee, from Mississippi, in 1984 and has served since. Director of White House political affairs, 1985-86. Adviser to 1988 Bush campaign. Partner in law firm of Haley & Rogers, with offices in Washington and Mississippi

Quote: “If you make abortion the threshold issue of Republicanism, you need your heads examined,” in response to questions following his election as RNC chairman