The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

MR. MacNeil: Good evening. I'm Robert MacNeil in New York.

MR. LEHRER: And I'm Jim Lehrer in Washington. After our summary of the news this Friday, we dissect the coming and the going of Zoe Baird. David Gergen and Mark Shields examine the political ruins, Tom Bearden and four others look at her case exposed about hiring illegal aliens. We close with an essay about inaugural symbols by Clarence Page. NEWS SUMMARY

MR. MacNeil: With the stroke of a pen, President Clinton today reversed several anti-abortion rules imposed during the Reagan and Bush years. He overturned the ban on abortion counseling at federally funded clinics, lifted the ban on fetal tissue research and the rule against abortions at military hospitals overseas. He also ordered a review of the ban on RU486, the French anti- pregnancy pill. Before signing the executive orders, Mr. Clinton had this to say.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: As a nation, our goal should be to protect individual freedom, while fostering responsible decision making, an approach that seeks to protect the right to choose, while reducing the number of abortions. Our vision should be of America where abortion is safe and legal but rare. Taken as a group, today's actions will go a long way toward protecting vital medical and health decisions from ideological and political debate. The American people deserve the best medical treatment in the world. We're committed to providing them with nothing less.

MR. MacNeil: To commemorate the 20th anniversary of Roe versus Wade anti-abortion forces held a protest rally outside the White House and then marched to the Supreme Court. Police estimated the crowd at 75,000. Congressman Chris Smith, a Republican from New Jersey, spoke at a news conference before the rally.

REP. CHRIS SMITH, [R] New Jersey: Mr. Clinton is fast becoming the abortion President. Executive orders promoting abortions for teenagers and using baby brains and body parts for transplantation undermine the carefully orchestrated illusion of Mr. Clinton and Mr. Gore as child advocates. You don't protect children by killing some of them, Mr. President. The rhetoric of choice is slick but does not mask the violence of abortion.

MR. LEHRER: President Clinton withdrew Zoe Baird's nomination as attorney general this morning. It followed a letter from her to Mr. Clinton. She said the controversy about her hiring illegal aliens would seriously impede her ability to run the Justice Department. Mr. Clinton said the nominee review process had failed to evaluate the issue completely, and he took full responsibility. During a picture taking session with his cabinet, reporters asked if accepting her withdrawal had been an agonizing decision.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: I'm sad about it, but it wasn't agonizing. I'm sad about it, and I take full responsibility, as I said in my statement, for, for the way the evaluation was done. It was -- I still have a very high regard for her. She is an extraordinary person. And I feel very badly about it, but I'm responsible for it, and I'm going to start this afternoon looking for an attorney general, and I have the process set up. And we're going to begin as soon as the lunch hour is over working on the future.

MR. LEHRER: Earlier in the day in the White House East Room 13 cabinet officers and 3 other top level appointees were sworn in by Chief Justice William Rehnquist. Mr. Clinton thanked the Senate for acting with historic speed in approving the nomination.

MR. MacNeil: President Clinton also abolished the so-called Competitiveness Council today. The Council was created during the Bush administration and chaired by then Vice President Dan Quayle. Its purpose was to review federal regulations that might hurt the competitiveness of American business. Critics charged that it was used to circumvent regulations protecting the environment, health and worker safety. Vice President Al Gore had this to say to reporters in his office.

VICE PRESIDENT GORE: I think that we'll do a better job at running the regulatory process. We're going to be extremely sensitive to business and all others who are affected by regulations that are put out, but we are, we are going to be committed to a process that will serve the American people honestly and openly with respect for the law and for their safety. And the idea of having a back door into the policy making process through which only special interests walk, those days are over with.

MR. MacNeil: In economic news, the government said construction of new homes grew in 1992 for the first time in six years. Housing starts rose 5 1/2 percent in December, and 18 1/2 percent for all of last year. Many analysts said they expected growth to continue this year but at a slower rate. McDonnell-Douglas Corporation today said it will cut 4,000 jobs in its commercial jet division this year. That represents more than 20 percent of the division's work force. A spokesman said the cuts were due to a fall off in orders from the airline industry.

MR. LEHRER: An Air Force jet fired two missiles at an Iraqi air defense facility today. Pentagon officials said the facility's radar had locked on to two U.S. warplanes. An Iraqi government statement denied that. More United Nations weapons inspectors arrived in Baghdad today. It was the second group to go theresince Iraq removed restrictions from U.N. flights earlier this week.

MR. MacNeil: Seven former Soviet republics signed an agreement providing for closer coordination of policies but Ukraine took Menistan and Moldova refused to go along. The signing took place at a summit of commonwealth independent states in Minsk, which is the capital of Belarus. A commonwealth spokesman said the non- signing republics were afraid of a resurgence of a Soviet-style union. The leaders also failed to resolve differences over who should control the former Soviet nuclear arsenal.

MR. LEHRER: And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to the politics and the immigration law fallouts from the Zoe Baird case, and to a Clarence Page essay. FOCUS - JUDICIOUS CHOICE?

MR. LEHRER: The fallouts from the fall of Zoe Baird are our major focuses tonight. She decided last night to end her nomination as President Clinton's attorney general. This afternoon, the President was asked why he nominated Baird even though she had hired illegal aliens to work in her home.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: I think the American people are entitled to know -- well, if you go back to my statement, I acknowledge that there were errors in the evaluation process for which I take full responsibility. What happened was this: She voluntarily disclosed that. It was not in any way picked up in the vetting. It was, as you know, we were trying to make a Christmas deadline, which is probably my error again on this, so just before she was announced, but after I had discussed the appointment with her, I was told that this matter had come up. Nobody said anything to me about the taxes, and what I was told was what you heard and in a very cursory way was that an error had been made in the hiring of an illegal alien, that it had been made after consulting a lawyer, who is an expert in this area. So basically they had acted on counsel's advice, but they were wrong, that they had moved immediately to try to correct it, and that the status had been corrected in terms of legality and that the vetter's conclusion was it would be no problem. I have to tell you that during the course of these inquiries, I received other weightier warnings, if you will, of things which had to be worked through with other potential nominees. In retrospect, what I should have done is to basically delay the whole thing for a couple of days and look into it in greater depth. But that was -- I take full responsibility for that. It is in no way -- this process is in no way a reflection on her. We would not have known any of this had she not disclosed it to us and to the United States Senate subsequently. So I will say again what I said this morning, I'm sorry about this. I still think she is an extraordinary person and a very able person who will have a rich and successful career, and I take full responsibility for what happened in the due process.

MR. MacNeil: Gergen and Shields are here now to sift through the political ruins of all of this for President Clinton. David Gergen is editor at large of U.S. News & World Report. Mark Shields is a syndicated columnist. Mark, the decision to withdraw, was the right one?

MR. SHIELDS: Yes, it was the right one. It was going -- it was beyond a hemorrhage. It had eroded any support, any prospects of her being confirmed. By doing so, Bill Clinton saved Zoe Baird from further embarrassment, what could only have been publicly painful, saved the Senators from casting a painful vote, saved George Mitchell, as Majority Leader, from the unhappy task of trying to round up unwilling Democrats to support the nomination, and certain defeat. So it was all that he could do.

MR. LEHRER: Dave, do you agree that there really wasn't a decision when it finally came down to it?

MR. GERGEN: There was no choice in the end, Jim. It was just a matter of time. In fact, I think it's only been a matter of time for several days now. It's not only spared I think a lot of people in Washington, but I think it spared the country from having someone whom they felt that was not playing by the rules and yet was still getting ahead, and that was exactly what Bill Clinton promised he would not do.

MR. LEHRER: So even if he had somehow prevailed, he being Clinton, he would still have lost in the long run, you mean?

MR. GERGEN: I think that they made a series of mistakes right from the beginning, and I think the President very graciously came out and took responsibility for it. There's no question in the vetting of her nomination they did not understand that a violation of the law, a couple of violations of the law, would not be permissible for someone who's going to serve as the highest law enforcement authority in the land. You know, frankly, I don't think they understood as well that in all the glitter of the inaugural, all the sense people have had is too much money involved in so many things, the Ron Brown nomination and the Zoe Baird nomination, the woman's making $600,000 paying illegal aliens, and then the inauguration, itself. I think that stirred up some class resentments in this country. I think people saw there was too much yuppiedom, and they didn't like it, and they resented it, and they said, you know, by God, enough is enough.

MR. LEHRER: Mark, whenever something like this happens, there are always people like the three of us sit around and say, my goodness, how could they have had such a blind spot? And it's a big "they" in this case. It's not just Bill Clinton as a person, the President of the United States, the people around him -- obviously, some people in the Senate Judiciary Committee, I mean, they went to them and they said, oh, yeah, no problem, no problem, no problem, a huge problem. And David, in fact, I must say you said this on this program last week, that this may turn out to be a much bigger problem than people realize. Explain the blind spot.

MR. SHIELDS: I think the blind spot, first of all, it goes to the President. Every administration is inevitably a mirror reflection of the man at the top. Bill Clinton failed to understand I think the crucial importance, first of all, of the job of attorney general. The attorney general, I think, is domestically the single most important nominee. The Department of Justice by its very divisions, criminal, civil rights, anti-trust, environment, I mean, that's the heart and guts and soul of an administration. It is no accident that John Kennedy chose Robert Kennedy. It is no accident that Richard Nixon chose John Mitchell, or that Griffin Bell was chosen by Jimmy Carter or William French Smith by Ronald Reagan. Each one wanted an attorney general that he knew, trusted, and really could expect. You could argue with the choices, but each one knew Bill Clinton really didn't know Zoe Baird. He had consigned that position to a woman. She was the last standing woman. She was left without a core constituency. She had no core constituency. She was not the choice of environmentalists, of labor, of feminists, of civil rights. There were no groups behind her. There was nothing within the Democratic Party to support her. The only thing she really had going was her gender and ability, I mean, as an individual but if someone had said to you this is Joe Baird, Joe Baird, 40 years old, general counsel for Aetna, and worked for General Electric, supports Dan Quayle's tort reforms, going to be the attorney general for Bill Clinton, are you kidding me? I mean, the Times, the Post, everybody would have been editorializing against it. So why didn't, why didn't it happen? He got caught in a clinch. He said I promise -- he imposed his own deadline -- Christmas eve I'm going to have it. He didn't know her, she was chosen, and I think David is absolutely right, that there was more than a class distinction. They did underestimate the reaction that would follow, and the report today that they're talking about, the Immigration & Naturalization Service moving against the couple who had worked for them and possible deportation, while the Aetna counsel gets off by writing a check is just a total absolute statement about unfairness.

MR. LEHRER: Has Bill Clinton been seriously hurt by this, or did it come and go quickly enough that he's, he's all right?

MR. GERGEN: Well, Jim, I think he was very embarrassed by it, and I think it was at a moment when he did not particularly want it, inaugural week, a festive week. He'd like to go out on a high. He had a good inaugural day. He had a good inaugural address, and to have this as a dampening effect the end of the week is tough. I must tell you that other administrations have easily survived this. The Bush administration with Jim Tower, not only did they get -- they were embarrassed the same way, but they went on and found Dick Cheney and he turned out to be a superb appointment, a better appointment than John Tower.

MR. LEHRER: But that one went on for, went on for weeks.

MR. GERGEN: Went on for a much longer time.

MR. LEHRER: They fought that one out to the vote, in fact.

MR. GERGEN: Well, that's correct, and it was more agony, and there was a lot of bitterness on both sides on that, but I think that, you know, they came out with a better candidate. I imagine that, in truth, to go to Mark's point, I think that they probably will come up with an attorney general now, a person of more stature and more support around the country, and I think that will be healthy for Bill Clinton.

MR. LEHRER: Does it have to be a woman? Do you think they're committed now?

MR. GERGEN: I think they make a mistake if they limit their nominees to a woman. I think people have had enough of this. Only gender, you know, will count for this position. It has been clear from the beginning. I think it'd be fine if they picked a woman. You know, talking about Pat Wall, the woman, they've gone to an appeals court judge, someone they clearly would like to have, they've gone to her twice and not succeeded in persuading her to do it. She -- you know -- many, many people think she'd be first rate. There are many other qualified women who do this, but I think people are -- I think Americans find it just peculiar that only a woman can qualify for this job.

MR. LEHRER: But isn't -- but wouldn't it be equally peculiar, Mark, for them to come around and say, well, wait a minute, we nominated a woman and she had this problem so all bets are off now, we'll go back in and find a routine or a regular white male?

MR. SHIELDS: All bets are off, Jim. I mean, I think David's right. It's not a lethal blow or anything of the sort, or fatal cut. After John Tower, George Bush went on to 91 percent in the polls, and I don't think anybody came out of the exit polls on November 3, 1992, said the reason I voted against George Bush is because of John Tower's nomination. I think what they need is somebody of high stature, of considerable ethical integrity and established credentials that way. Most of all, he's confirmable. That's one of the values that Pat Wall does bring of the U.S. Court of Appeals here in the District of Columbia. I would toss in another name, Ag Migfa, former member of Congress, member of the Court of Appeals, that rarest of all political sub-species, a likeable liberal with a sense of humor that's self-deprecating. I mean, that is truly rare, and he's got the respect of those around him.

MR. LEHRER: Talk about some other things that --

MR. GERGEN: Can I just make one more point?

MR. LEHRER: Sure.

MR. GERGEN: If you don't mind -- and that is in some ways it'll be a benefit if the White House sees it as a wake-up call. The party is over. It's time to get serious about government and get down to serious business. This party's been going a long time, wonderful party, but the President suffered during the closing weeks of the transition because of his sloppiness, and he's now paying the price for the sloppiness at the end of the transition. They've got to get down to work and get a hold.

MR. LEHRER: Speaking of that, the other thing that happened today that was striking, and we just saw it, Robin reported in the News Summary, the President of the United States sat down there with his left hand and signed three document that had to do with abortion rights after -- and just like that -- these issues that we have debated extensively on this program and 12 years of Presidents that were on the other side, and this man sat down and talking obviously about the abortion, abortion pill, the fetal tissue, and the ban on counseling and also on abortions in military, that is really what elections in the final analysis are all about, is it not, David?

MR. GERGEN: That's absolutely right. You know, Mark just said the other day that campaigns do matter, and people expected change, and by golly, this is the change they wanted. I think he's now delivering on what he promised. Of course, there are people who are angry about it, of course, there are people on the streets --

MR. LEHRER: Sure, if you're on the other side --

MR. GERGEN: The 20th anniversary of Roe V. Wade, people are in the streets tonight protesting, but this is what he promised the electorate. He's delivering that. I think people will think well of him for doing that.

MR. LEHRER: Do you agree with that, Mark, this is a good reminder of what elections are all about?

MR. SHIELDS: Sure. I mean, Bill Clinton, this isn't something he said, oh, I forgot to tell you. I mean, it was there. He was going to do it, and one of the things that the, the folks at the White House pointed out even to those on the other side today was that he waited until the march was over to sign these. He showed a certain sensitivity. He wasn't doing it at morning so that there would be a bitterness and a rancor. I mean, he did it at a time when he felt it would not lead to public confrontation or, or even greater pain for those involved. So I mean he did it, and he ran on it. I mean, that is -- campaigns do matter, and I think that, that's a lesson of 1992, and we'll find out in about three and a half weeks whether, in fact, Bill Clinton's economic message which he also ran on is going to be -- in many respects, it's a lot easier to sign an executive order than it is to put together an economic package.

MR. LEHRER: David, what did you think of the big open house yesterday at the White House?

MR. GERGEN: Well, I liked the open house. I was -- it seems to me that people enjoyed -- you know, George Bush had an open house, Bill Clinton had an open house. I think they're terrific. It went on a long time, and they had a couple of miscues, but I think people enjoyed it. What I did find, I must tell you, bizarre is the fact that after the open house was over, after an exhausting day, after an exhausting week, that the telephone calls about Zoe Baird were taking place last night between 12 o'clock and 1 o'clock in the morning with Bill Clinton rattling around the White House, the White House offices, and he pulled the nomination at 1:22 in the morning. Does this guy ever sleep?

MR. SHIELDS: I don't know if he ever sleeps. I would have to say this about yesterday. It worked in a strange way politically for him. If, in fact -- because while all the talk about Zoe Baird was going on, Bill Clinton was showing a side of himself which no President, in my memory, can match, and that is on a one-on-one basis with ordinary people he is more natural, more comfortable, and more at ease and more believable than any chief executive of my lifetime. I mean, he is truly -- he does that so well. It isn't contrived. It's not -- it's not a photo op. He really enjoys it, and now you can start to question how much of it he enjoys, how much of it is too much, but he is wonderful at it.

MR. LEHRER: He leans down and he asks some kid, how old are you, and the kid says, six. The rest of us would lean down and ask with everybody around, you know, how old are you, and the kid would run. There's something, there's something about that.

MR. GERGEN: There's this old story about Nixon when he was in a motorcade once in Florida and one of the people in the motorcade, one of the policemen, a fellow had an accident, went over on the pavement. Nixon very kindly got out of the car and went to talk to him and he was so uncomfortable with him -- he said how do you like your work -- that was his first question.

MR. SHIELDS: The poor guy's lying there with a broken leg and his motorcycle on top of him.

MR. LEHRER: All right. David Gergen, Mark Shields, thank you. See you next week.

MR. MacNeil: Now it's on to the child care issues raised by the Zoe Baird situation and final thoughts on the inaugural from essayist Clarence Page. FOCUS - HELP WANTED

MR. MacNeil: The Zoe Baird controversy focused national attention on the link between child care and illegal immigration. And that's where we focus next. There are more than 26 million school age children whose parents work and who need child care, and there are millions of illegal immigrants willing to take care of children. The result is a market for immigrant labor in many American households. The only obstacle is the law. How common is breaking that law? We'll explore that in a moment, but first we hear one Denver woman's story as told to Correspondent Tom Bearden. For privacy reasons, she remained in silhouette during the interview.

DENVER WOMAN: When my first child was born I had a live out woman who came into the household and she came in three days a week. And when I had my second child, we hired a woman from Mexico, from Salteo, and she was a live-in and took care of both children for about a year and a half. And then this last summer we were in- between one nanny and another, and we hired a new one from Chile that lasted about five months.

MR. BEARDEN: That was the undocumented worker?

DENVER WOMAN: Mm hm.

MR. BEARDEN: Why did you hire an undocumented worker?

DENVER WOMAN: That's difficult to say, other than I would like my children to be bilingual, and, therefore, I was interested in her, and you do pay less for people who are from another country. It doesn't cost as much as if you hired someone from in the states.

MR. BEARDEN: How much less? General terms.

DENVER WOMAN: A couple hundred a month.

MR. BEARDEN: Is the money important when you come to make a decision like that?

DENVER WOMAN: Obviously so. It isn't just what -- it isn't just the cost of child care. It's also the cost of Social Security and, and the paper work that you have to do to do withholding and file all those documents. That's a little complicated too.

MR. BEARDEN: You've done that before.

DENVER WOMAN: Yes. So I could have done it again. So it probably came down to how much money we wanted to spend on child care.

MR. BEARDEN: How much do you pay for child care? Round numbers.

DENVER WOMAN: Eight hundred a month, eight hundred to a thousand a month, depending on hours or services that they do in the household.

MR. BEARDEN: What went through your mind as you made the decision to hire the Chilean woman regarding the legality of that, of the Social Security and all of that sort of thing?

DENVER WOMAN: Well, previous to her, I was, I was really a stickler about wanting to do withholding and wanting to pay Social Security. And whenever we hired someone or whenever we went through the interviewing process, we always discussed that with the person that we intended to do those things. And I -- you know, I can't tell you, other than maybe we have so many friends who don't do withholding, who don't do Social Security, that for some reason it becomes, it becomes okay, because nobody else seems to do it that you wonder if you're being, sticking to the law too closely or being too picky about it, so this time around it really didn't, it didn't occur to me, other than wanting to know if she could travel and get on airplanes and do trips with us, which she could, because she had traveling papers. So I didn't give it that much thought this time around, although now with my third one, we are withholding again, and doing Social Security.

MR. BEARDEN: Was there ever a sense in your mind that since so many of your friends weren't doing the Social Security withholding that you were being kind of foolish?

DENVER WOMAN: Because I was?

MR. BEARDEN: Because you were.

DENVER WOMAN: Well, certainly it -- you would feel like you were spending way too much money, and far more than everybody else is, so, yeah, there was -- you have your moments when you think you're overspending for what you're getting.

MR. BEARDEN: Roughly how many of your friends hire undocumented workers?

DENVER WOMAN: I don't know anyone who's done it legally; not that they're undocumented workers. They might be U.S. citizens, but even U.S. citizens a lot of times will walk into your household for an interview and say, oh, now if you're going to do withholding and if you're going to pay Social Security, you need to pay me a lot more money.

MR. BEARDEN: Were you aware of the penalties when you hired this woman?

DENVER WOMAN: No.

MR. BEARDEN: But you knew it was illegal?

DENVER WOMAN: Yes. I guess my assumption was that if I did get caught, I'd have to pay back Social Security and I'd also have to pay back interest and, and yeah probably that there would be a penalty involved. How much I wouldn't have any idea.

MR. BEARDEN: Was it something that weighed on your mind? Were you nervous about it when you hired this woman while she was employed with you?

DENVER WOMAN: No. It's too common. It happens too frequently, so no, but it's almost like you said earlier. Were you foolish because you always paid in? Well, I don't know. That's the legal way to handle it. It would certainly help if we could tax deduct the Social Security. I think that would make a huge difference as to how many people would file and do it legally. It would also help if the paper work were easier to do. Fortunately for me I have a business so it's easy for me to do the withholding and the Social Security because I have established paper work and know how to do it. But I'd say the majority of households don't have that benefit so it, it's completely -- one, it's completely baffling, and two, you can't tax deduct it. And why would you be paying a Social Security tax that you can't tax deduct?

MR. BEARDEN: Does the employer of an undocumented worker have too much power over that person? There are some who believe that people who hire undocumented aliens gain an unfair power over them, it gives them influence over them because they're, in a sense, collaborating in something that's against the law. Do you agree with that, or have any thoughts about that?

DENVER WOMAN: I guess I would disagree with that. The one thing that you get in undocumented child care or the biggest thing that you probably get, my woman from Mexico was available to me 24 hours a day. I mean, her cost of living in Mexico and quality of life in Mexico compared to what she got in my household were two extremes. When we hired her, she said, I'll get up with the baby, I'll be available all hours of the day, I'll clean the house, I'll cook. They do everything. And if you hire someone from here in the states, all they're going to do is take care of your children. So not only do you have a differentiation in price, you have a differentiation in services in your household. I have to admit that was, at that point, with a newborn infant, was wonderful to have someone who was so available so --

MR. BEARDEN: And it's not like indentured servitude?

DENVER WOMAN: That crossed my mind, and after she had been here for six months or so, we, we went to a schedule where she was finished at 6 or 7 o'clock at night. And I don't think I ever really took advantage of her. Once a week I'd have her get up with the baby, so I didn't -- she was available to me, but I don't feel like I really took advantage of her, other than the fact that I paid her less and she was certainly more available. But she got paid more here than she would have gotten paid if she'd stayed where she was.

MR. BEARDEN: How hard is it to find qualified help?

DENVER WOMAN: Very difficult to find qualified help. And we have two nanny schools in the area, so you would think we'd have a better chance of getting qualified help. But it depends on how picky you are, I suppose.

MR. MacNeil: How common is the practice of hiring illegal aliens for child care? We have four views. Judsen Culbreth is the editor in chief of Working Mother Magazine. Priscilla Labovitz is an immigration lawyer in Washington, D.C. Reynaldo Guerrero is staff attorney for the Center for Immigrant Rights in New York. Paul Virtue is deputy general counsel for the INS, the Immigration & Naturalization Service. Ms. Culbreth, do you agree that the hiring of illegal immigrants for child care is very common?

MS. CULBRETH: Is very common, and has flourished under the nose of the government for many years. There's this great underground nanny network.

MR. MacNeil: Now, why is there such a shortage of legal child care workers and, therefore, such demand for the illegals?

MS. CULBRETH: Well, there's a shortage because the average child care worker is paid $4.01 an hour. It is a hard job. It takes a lot out of you. The hours are long. It's not a 9 to 5. It's more an 8 to 6 or longer. And so a lot of people don't gravitate to these fields. It takes so much, much out of you. And, in fact, most children, most pre-school children, there are half the spaces that children need. There are 13 million children who need child care and there are half that many slots, legal, licensed slots for them.

MR. MacNeil: If a woman wanted, a mother or a couple, father, mother, whatever, wanted to be legal, is there a supply of, adequate supply of legal American or resident alien workers who could do the work?

MS. CULBRETH: No, there is not, not for infants, not for preschoolers, not for toddlers, not for after school care. There's a real shortage of qualified people who, who want to do this and qualified centers. There's something like 86,000 registered child care centers in the whole country, and the supply is like 23 million children that need it.

MR. MacNeil: The woman we interviewed in Denver was clearly quite well-to-do. Is this a yuppie crime as it's been described, this hiring of illegal immigrants for child care, or is it across- the-board?

MS. CULBRETH: Well, I think the illegal alien problem probably is an upper, middle class, upper middle class problem. I don't see it as a crime necessarily. I think it's more criminal some of the other things that we're dealing with, children having to stay alone if their mothers are poor and they can't afford child care at all. I think it's pretty criminal that one out of two sixth graders comes home to an empty house every day. I think it's criminal that we're just now focusing attention on child care, and it takes something like Zoe Baird's defeat to do that.

MR. MacNeil: Mr. Guerrero, why do you think it is so common? You agree, I presume. And why do you think it is so common?

MR. GUERRERO: Well, here in New York City, one out of three New Yorkers are foreign born. There are many immigrant workers. Traditionally this has been a gateway for immigrants, and there's always a myth that immigrants or undocumented immigrants take jobs away from American workers. The fact is that there are jobs that American workers will not do. Those are odd jobs. They're very difficult jobs, and --

MR. MacNeil: And do you agree that American workers by and large won't do child care and domestic work?

MR. GUERRERO: I agree that a lot of, of American workers will not do that work and will look for cheap labor, and here in New York, you'll see many immigrant workers being exploited and abused by employers. We at the Center for Immigrant Rights are working not only with domestic workers but day laborers as well.

MR. MacNeil: Do you think that illegal immigrants here who are employed like the one by the woman you just heard interviewed are being exploited, or there is a good fit of need for jobs and jobs that need done and, therefore, it's fulfilling a service? In other words, is it exploitation?

MR. GUERRERO: Well, I think you have to look at the position of both parties. From an employer's point of view, the employer can usually dictate the wages of the individual, the hours. One who is not employed, who is unemployed doesn't have a strong bargaining position, and often are what one employer might think, well, I'm providing this person with a, with a home, with food, et cetera, it may not be apparent to that individual, but that person does have a lot of decisions that --

MR. MacNeil: Of course, that's what the 1986 immigration reform was intended to cure, was it not, the exploitation of illegal immigrants, and at the same time to try and to try and improve conditions for legal ones.

MR. GUERRERO: Well, with the passage of IRCA in 1986, the objectives of this law were twofold. It was to deter illegal immigration, and it was to improve working conditions for American workers and authorized workers. Now seven years have gone by, and we have to ask ourselves, if these objectives of IRCA were meant. And I think that any reasonable person is going to tell you that illegal immigration has not been deterred. People, immigrant persons who are hungry, who are poor, who are being persecuted in their own countries, are still coming into the United States. And I also think that if you look at our economy right now, it has not improved the working conditions of American, of the American worker or authorized workers.

MR. MacNeil: Okay. We'll come back to that point. Ms. Labovitz in Washington, you work with people who are trying to do this legally, as I understand it. Take us through the steps someone goes through trying to find the sort of help we're talking about with the -- and facing the current immigration laws.

MS. LABOVITZ: It's a three-step process. First the employer applies to the Labor Department and proves to the Labor Department that he or, more commonly, she is offering the prevailing wage, which currently in Washington is $7.22 an hour, that the working conditions are fair, that the hours are reasonable. The position's advertised for three days in the local newspaper, and the employer must prove that he or she's been unable to find a qualified American. And that's pretty easy to do, because if you run an ad in the Washington Post, you might get 50 calls, but almost all of them will be from undocumented workers. After the employer receives something called the labor certification from the Department of Labor, which by the way is not a permit to work, it's merely the Labor Department's lack of objection to the individual's eventually receiving a green card, after the employer has received this labor certification, the individual files an application with the Immigration Service. At that point they tell the Immigration Service where they are and who's going to work for them and that they have enough money to pay the wage. Then the approved application is sent to the State Department where the child care worker or the home care worker, whoever this is, then languishes on a waiting list for probably 10 years because in 1990 the Congress changed the law and reduced the number of green cards available to less skilled workers like child care and elder care providers to 10,000 a year. And that means from the whole world, only 10,000 people are allowed in legally to provide that service.

MR. MacNeil: So although they haven't got the green card and may not get it for many years, but in many cases, they just start working for the employer, is that right?

MS. LABOVITZ: That's right. The employer wants that individual now, not in 10 years. And so usually the employer knows it. The employee wants the labor certification, wants to get on that waiting list, because it's the best, in most cases, she can do. So she will -- they will apply, and she will be illegal in the interim. I tell my clients that in the interim they must pay, they must pay the person the prevailing wage, and they have to pay their taxes and their Social Security, and they know that they're vulnerable to being fined if they're, if it comes to the attention of the Immigration Service, and they, and the worker knows that she could be deported. So there's a tremendous risk, particularly for the worker who faces deportation.

MR. MacNeil: And do you believe the Immigration & National Service, Nationalization Service knows all about this but just looks the other way?

MS. LABOVITZ: Well, the information's in their files. They have bigger fish to fry. There are a lot worse things that the Immigration Service can be working on. They can go into a factory where workers are being, are locked in, and where they're paying minimum -- being paid minimum wage and they can arrest a lot of people and get someone who's truly exploiting his employees, or they can arrest people who've been, undocumented people who've committed crimes.

MR. MacNeil: Well, let's get Mr. Virtue's view. As a counsel for the Immigration Service, is that right, you have much bigger fish to fry so you just tend to ignore what's going on in the domestic care situation?

MR. VIRTUE: Well, our emphasis is really in the enforcement area. Of course, we also are in the business of bringing people lawfully into the United States. But in the enforcement area, our focus has been primarily on those aliens who commit crimes in the United States. And we put a lot of our resources into that. In the employer sanctions area, yes, I think most of our investigations are where we get leads from people, where there are a number of aliens, undocumented aliens, being brought in the United States for employment and being employed in violation of the law. So in the domestic area we haven't seen a lot of activity. It's a resource issue. I think it's also an education issue, because I think we've focused a lot of educational efforts on the bigger employers.

MR. MacNeil: Now you say it's a resource issue. If you had more inspectors, you would look more at the domestic violations, is that what you mean?

MR. VIRTUE: Well, I don't know. I don't know if we would ever have enough resources. I don't know that we would want to. I think that we would probably put more resources in enforcing the laws against those who commit crimes in the United States, to be quite honest with you.

MR. MacNeil: What areas do you go looking for violations of the '86 law? In what kinds of businesses are you particularly searching?

MR. VIRTUE: Well, all sorts of businesses across-the-board. The business profile that we've been involved in in the fines area pretty much tracks the profile of sectors that we see, the retail sector, the service sectors being the largest by far, wholesale. Agriculture, although it represents only about 3 percent of the employer profile, represents about 6 percent of our activity with regard to employer sanctions. So those are the areas. And we are typically focused in on leads, on information that is given to us by --

MR. MacNeil: Tip-offs.

MR. VIRTUE: -- other enforcement agencies, exactly, tip- offs.

MR. MacNeil: Now, Mr. Guerrero says he doesn't think the '86 law is working because he says it hasn't stopped illegal immigration, and it hasn't greatly improved conditions for legal workers here, American or documented workers here.

MR. VIRTUE: Well, I don't think you can blame it all on the law though. I think Ms. Culbreth had a point, and that is that when she mentioned the fact that the, the average salary for somebody in the area is about $4.10 an hour, where the prevailing wage, at least in this area is $7.22 an hour, so I think the market has not gotten to work in this area. And that's one of the reasons that you see not a great number of authorized either aliens or U.S., you know, U.S. workers being involved in this area.

MR. MacNeil: But doesn't that state of affairs though create an incentive for illegals to come here, for young women to come, knowing through the grape vine that there's going to be work for them, even though it may not be very well paid by American standards, a lot better paid in the case of that woman from Mexico we heard described in the interview from Denver? Isn't it an incentive for more illegal immigration?

MR. VIRTUE: There's a great incentive for people to come in, but I don't think that was -- that was not certainly created by the Immigration Act of 1986 certainly. I think it has made strides in other industries, but quite honestly we haven't seen a lot of activity in the area of domestic and household employees. I mean, when we get an investigation that goes forward, then we take action with regard to the penalties, but that is, that is relatively few cases compared to our overall fines.

MR. MacNeil: Let's go back to Ms. Culbreth. The woman we heard Tom Bearden interview in Denver said the biggest thing she got from the Mexican lady was she was willing, she was available 24 hours a day and she would do any kind of work. Are these immigrants being exploited, or is there a good -- given their circumstances when they come -- is it a good match of labor to need?

MS. CULBRETH: Well, I think some -- it's an individual case. I mean, you'd have to examine every household to see what is going on, but I think often these arrangements work out satisfactorily for employer and employee, and whereas there may be abuse on the part of some employers, there are a lot of employees who have workers quit overnight. In fact, the turnover in child care, 93 percent of working mothers report that they've had to change child care at least twice in the past year, so there's amazing amount of turnover, and so I think there might be give and take on both sides.

MR. MacNeil: How do you feel about this, that side of it, Ms. Labovitz, from what you see?

MS. LABOVITZ: Do I think there's exploitation?

MR. MacNeil: Yeah.

MS. LABOVITZ: Oh, I definitely think there's some exploitation. I think the exploitation would be a lot less if there were fewer, if the wait were shorter. That would mean that an individual would be applied for and she would, in shorter order, she'd get her green card, and then she'd be free to leave. She's exploited if she can't leave. And you can't leave if you're illegal without going -- unless you can go find another job and start all over again and go to the end of the waiting line again. So this certainly, one way of ending the exploitation is to make it possible for these people to work and be paid and be free to leave.

MR. MacNeil: You believe, Mr. Guerrero, that these women who are doing domestic work under, without documentation are being exploited?

MR. GUERRERO: I think that there are cases we've had at the Center for Immigrants' Rights where women were being, have -- we have reports of women being sexually harassed. We had one particular incident that I recall not too long ago. A couple came to our office and they were actually being not allowed to leave the premises of the employer and had actually been beaten by the employer and were terrified, terrified, and they were in a very abusive, exploitive situation, and I think that it does encourage abuse and exploitation. I think that this law -- I think you have to look at the ramifications of the law and see that it's, it's not fulfilling what its intended purpose is, and it has a discriminatory impact on people of color, employers, the government; the General Accounting Office in 1990 revealed in a study that 19 percent of the employers surveyed were committing unlawful practices and that this law was, was creating widespread discrimination among Latinos, people of color, and other --

MR. MacNeil: I know that's an important point, and it was one of the points raised during the debate about the Act seven years ago, but can we just stay on this for our remaining minutes. Ms. Labovitz, what do you think is the solution to this situation?

MS. LABOVITZ: Well, there's several problems here so there needs to be several solutions. With respect to, to the day care problem, it can't be solved with immigration. But as long as American workers don't want to do this job, there will be people coming in who want to fill them and in that way legalize their status because they want to be in the United States, they want to live here. The wait would be shorter if Congress would increase the number of visas available per year at least for necessary workers in jobs no American wants to do, in other words, providing child care, care for the elderly, and care for disabled people.

MR. MacNeil: In other words, create a class of immigrants for that purpose?

MS. LABOVITZ: Precisely. Now that may not be the exhaustive list of those who might be in that category. Those are the ones I know about and I know there's a shortage of, and I know not only from my clients but from, but from friends and people I meet who need day care, and they're not all people who are, want to hire Mary Poppins because they're very rich and they don't want to take care of their own children. Oftentimes families sponsor by getting together -- two or three families might share a day care provider and the best, most wonderful, reliable, loving person they can find to care for their children is someone from another country.

MR. MacNeil: Ms. Culbreth, what do you think is the solution to this?

MS. CULBRETH: Well, you know, other countries, France --

MR. MacNeil: What we might call the "Zoe Baird problem."

MS. CULBRETH: France, for example, makes it easy and helps parents get legal, licensed child care, and they make it easy for - - they increase the supply of child care givers by, by giving them, paying or utilities, for example, giving them food, tax incentives, retirement benefits, and they refund the payment, their sort of Social Security to parents. When parents pay it, the government gives that back to them. And it's very simplified and convenient because they want licensed, legal child care. If we want that in this country, then we have to look at child care comprehensively and make it simpler for parents to obey the law.

MR. MacNeil: Mr. Virtue, what do you think as somebody who's trying to administer this law as it exists, what do you think the solution is?

MR. VIRTUE: Well, I agree. I don't think employer sanctions can be seen as a panacea in this area. I think we do need alternative - - as a father, I think we need alternative child care opportunities. I don't know that the government can afford necessarily to subsidize that, but I think we're -- you know, I think we have enough resources available and people to think about this issue that we ought to be able to come up with alternative sources. I think Congress may as well look at the numbers of visas to be available in a given year as well, and take another look. It's been '86 -- actually 1990 when we last took a look at that,and that was a snapshot.

MR. MacNeil: Mr. Guerrero, you think the immigration law should be changed again.

MR. GUERRERO: I think the --

MR. MacNeil: By increasing the number of green cards, or how else?

MR. GUERRERO: I think the law should be repealed because it is not doing what it's intended to do. It can't be enforced. The government has spent a lot of money on education, trying to educate employers about how this law is supposed to play itself out.

MR. MacNeil: I'm awfully sorry to interrupt you. I get your gist, and I'm sure we'll do other stories on this, but our time is up. Thank you all four very much. ESSAY - SYMBOLIC ACT

MR. LEHRER: Finally tonight an essay about the symbols of the Clinton inaugural. The essayist is Clarence Page of the Chicago Tribune.

CLARENCE PAGE: So this is what happens when the older generation turns over their keys to the kids. First, we threw a party, several days' worth of parties. Again and again the Clintons reminded us that this was the first inauguration for the Woodstock generation. What else do you expect from a couple who named their daughter Chelsea and took their political theme song from Fleetwood Mac?

[SONG]

CLARENCE PAGE: And what else do you expect from a President who, with no need of coaxing, plays saxophone, slipping in a few jazz licks to boot?

[CLINTON PLAYING SAXOPHONE]

CLARENCE PAGE: The first inauguration of the Woodstock generation produced another Woodstock of sorts, four days of fun and music, lots of music, but mixed just to reassure our parents' generation with generous respect for tradition.

[SONG]

CLARENCE PAGE: The Clintons and Gores traveled all the way to Monticello just to ride back with much fanfare on a bus, drawing a symbolic link to Thomas Jefferson. The signal from this new President, whose middle name is Jefferson, told America he had not come to destroy the Jeffersonian tradition, democracy, enterprise, or inventiveness, but rather to fulfill it. And as dead Presidents go, Andrew Jackson, President of the common man and common woman, he was okay with the Clintons too. They opened up the White House just like Jackson did, but kept the guest list rather more controlled, which Jackson didn't. As a result, Jackson's inaugural open house turned into a melee as people with muddy boots trashed the place. Jackson escaped through a side window and spent the rest of the day in a nearby saloon. Control was important at this Woodstock, so was diversity. Everything was carefully orchestrated around a central focus. Like its standard bearer, Bill Clinton, this inauguration set out to offer something for everybody.

[SONG]

CLARENCE PAGE: The theme was American reunion, the message, we're all one big happy family that needs to be brought back together after a period of divisiveness. At first glance, diversity would appear to be well reflected in the musical line-up. But take another look and you'll find it's not quite as diverse as it might at first appear to be. After all, Barbara Streisand is a terrific singer, but she's not a favorite of the MTV generation.

[SONG]

CLARENCE PAGE: Neither is Aretha Franklin actually, not so much MTV as light rock, golden oldies.

[SONG]

CLARENCE PAGE: Michael Jackson? Now there's an MTV generation star for you, but on the safe side. Kenny Rogers, country, yes, but hardly what you call hard core country. You want diversity? Where's Sister Souljah? If this was a radio station's line-up it would be called middle of the road, centrist, like Bill Clinton's politics, walking that line between trying to find something for everybody and trying perhaps too hard to please everybody. Even the kids mixed old kids with new kids. Who could forget Diana Ross at the foot of Abe Lincoln in a hooped Scarlet O'Hara skirt? Or who could forget the Elvis sighting on a float in the inaugural parade? But there were frequent reminders of serious business here too, like the Monday night event that asked for cans of food for the homeless as the price of admission, or the silent marchers in the parade who carried patches of the AIDS quilt. There were more sobering symbols at the swearing in, including the first appearance by a poet laureate since Robert Frost at John Kennedy's inaugural. She was Maya Angelou, also the first woman and the first African-American poet laureate as well. But the symbols only began there. Her poetry turned to nature and to thoughts of tomorrow.

MAYA ANGELOU: [reciting "On the Pulse of Morning"] Here on the pulse of this fine day you may have the courage to look up and out and upon me, the Rock, the River, the Tree, your country.

CLARENCE PAGE: As a television event, the Clinton celebration made a strong statement but not a jarring one. It was the generational message, upbeat and progressive, but not radical. It seemed to say, "Rest easy, Mom and Dad, the kids have the keys now, but don't worry, we're not going to gun the motor or ride around in the rain with the top down. We'll take care of the family's business." The theme of reunion reminds us of why we Americans have been able to have one peaceful transition of power after another. It is because for all of our disagreements, we do agree on one central set of ideas that have the power to bind us. Lately, we've been thinking about tomorrow. Now tomorrow has come. I'm Clarence Page. RECAP

MR. MacNeil: Again, the main stories of this Friday, President Clinton signed a series of executive orders reversing Bush and Reagan policies on abortion, including the one which lifts the ban on abortion counseling at federally funded clinics. The President began a search for a new attorney general nominee after Zoe Baird withdrew because of the controversy over her hiring of illegal aliens. Good night, Jim.

MR. LEHRER: Good night, Robin. We'll see you on Monday night. Have a nice weekend. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.