The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

Funding for this program has been provided by this station and other public television stations and by grants from American Telephoairport terrorist attacks in Europe. And violence took five more lives in South Africa. We will have the details in our news summary coming up. Robin?

ROBERT MacNEIL: After the news summary, we focus first on the threat of a new wave of farm foreclosures. An angry farm-state governor debates the Department of Agriculture. Next, a documentary report on the controversy over a South Carolina man facing execution for a rape murder committed when he was a juvenile. Then our major focus tonight: four prominent Americans discuss where the country is and where it's going, as we begin 1986. News Summary

MacNEIL: A tense overnight standoff at the West Virginia penitentiary was settled peacefully today. About 200 prisoners at the 120-year-old Moundsville institution seized 16 hostages yesterday evening and threatened to kill some unless conditions were improved. One inmate died in the takeover. Correspondent Elizabeth Brackett reports on the outcome.

ELIZABETH BRACKETT: This news conference was part of the deal to release the 13 hostages. The inmates promised to free half of those held today and half tomorrow if they could sign an agreement negotiated with prison officials in front of the news media. But even at the last moment, the inmates had questions.

ALVIN GREGORY, inmate: Is this going to be a valid agreement or is this just going to be some type of ploy or something? That's what I mean. I need to know on behalf of the guys.

GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL: Okay. The governor and I both will sit down with you two and members of the committee that you have indicated for the negotiations.

BRACKETT [voice-over]: With the agreement signed, inmates told reporters why they had taken over the prison.

Mr. GREGORY: Are we going to be treated like human beings, like the people that we are? We don't know why we have to sleep in 10-below-degree weather in the midst of winter. We don't know why we have to sleep in 110-degree weather in summer.

BRACKETT: Conditions have been poor at the prison for years. Built in 1866, few changes have been made since then. Last year a federal judge issued an order to clean up the prison, but few changes have been made.

[voice-over] The first hint of the breakthrough came when the governor's press aide, John Price, left the prison at 1:30 this afternoon. Price told waiting reporters that the inmates' initial demands had been met.

JOHN PRICE, press aide: They will be protected from reprisals.

BRACKETT [voice-over]: For the families of those held hostage, the agreement brought relief. It had been a long night and day of waiting for families as their loved ones were held behind these prison walls. But late this afternoon the ordeal ended for at least half the families. Several joined their loved ones as the former hostages left the prison and were sped away in waiting ambulances.

MacNEIL: The prisoners were promised a meeting with Governor Arch Moore tomorrow. Elsewhere, there were two other prison disturbances. At Lorton Reformatory in Virginia, guards using tear gas quelled a rampage by 60 inmates. At Southampton correctional center in Capron, Virginia, five guards and 15 prisoners were injured in a series of fights. Jim?

LEHRER: The death toll in last week's attacks at the Rome and Vienna airports rose to 19 today. A 56-year-old Greek woman died this morning from a head wound suffered in the Rome attack. There was also a three-hour work stoppage at the Rome airport today. Some 3,000 airport employees stopped working to reinforce their demand for stepped-up security measures. They want metal detectors installed at entrances and labor union input into security discussions, among other things.

President Reagan responded with contempt today to the latest from Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi. Mr. Reagan told reporters, "I don't answer fellows who think it's all right to shoot 11-year-old girls," referring to the death of Natasha Simpson in the Rome attack. Qaddafi said yesterday any reprisals against his country for the attacks could lead to war. Today, State Department spokesman Charles Redman also spoke of Qaddafi's trying to justify the airport killings.

CHARLES REDMAN, State Department spokesman: We particularly abhor Qaddafi's making excuses for the indiscriminate slaughter of innocent men, women and children and rejecting the fact that these were pure acts of terrorism. Beyond this, we will not dignify his remarks.

LEHRER: The State Department also renewed its warnings to Americans about travelling to Libya and reminded all that special permission is required to do so.

MacNEIL: Lebanese President Amin Gemayel spent five hours with Syrian President Hafez al-Assad in Damascus today to discuss ways of enforcing a new Lebanese peace plan. The plan, signed by the main Christian and Moslem militia chiefs, was yet another attempt to end Lebanon's continuous civil war. But it broke down almost immediately and there was fighting today in the hills above Beirut.

LEHRER: The New Year's dying continued in South Africa. The death toll stood at 20 today after another round of protests and clashes between blacks and police. And in Port Elizabeth a large crowd of blacks turned out for the funeral of a white leader in the campaign against apartheid. She was killed in an automobile accident. Our report is from Michael Buerk of the BBC.

MICHAEL BUERK, BBC [voice-over]: Today her English-style church in this middle-class white suburb was swamped with blacks. Those that could crammed into the church to mourn Molly Blackburn their way -- an unusual, disconcerting experience in this divided country. The grief was shared by all races, with Anglican hymns and the revolutionary trappings of the banned African National Congress. By the time they wheeled her coffin out on its way to be cremated, the crowd outside had grown to 20,000 people. Whites came out on their balconies to see how much their neighbor had meant to blacks they know so little about. The police were there -- they said in case of trouble. In the township funerals their presence has often ended in confrontation and death. For a time it seemed it might happen here. In the end, 50 busloads of blacks went home. There was no trouble to mar their farewell to the woman they all called Molly.

LEHRER: On the U.S. economy, two new numbers were out today. The Commerce Department said factory orders were up 1 in November, and so was construction spending, 0.5 .

MacNEIL: The number of students enrolled in U.S. colleges and universities fell by 1 last year compared to 1984. A coalition of higher education groups reported that the drop coincided with the decline of 2.6 in the number of 18-to-24-year-olds, as the postwar baby boom tails off.The total number enrolled still passed the 12 million mark, where it's been since 1980.

LEHRER: And finally there is the news of Bill Veeck to report. Baseball's best known owner-character died today in Chicago. He was 71 years old. Baseball fans knew him well. For those who did not, here is how he was described by his wife, Mary Frances Veeck, in an opening narration she did for a recent documentary produced by public station WTTW in Chicago.

MARY FRANCES VEECK [voice-over]: And this is Bill Veeck. He's a legend in baseball. He's also a one-of-a-kind man. He's a dreamer who's not satisfied until his dreams come true in front of a full house. For 50 years Bill has dreamed of thousands of different schemes, always aimed at delighting the paying customers. He put a midget, Eddie Gaedel, up to bat. He put the players in shorts, installed a shower in the bleachers, landed Martians on the field and built the world's first exploding scoreboard. But Bill has had his ups and downs operating ballclubs. In Cleveland, the world champion 1948 Indians set a league attendance record that still hasn't been broken. But he nearly went broke five years later with the St. Louis Browns. The 1959 White Sox won a pennant. He originated Bat Day, Jacket Day, Cap Day, Music Day and many others. He was criticized by the other owners for some of his innovations, like putting names on uniforms. But they didn't hesitate to copy the ones that worked.

BILL VEECK [1959]: You know, I don't think that baseball's such a grim, serious thing. Sure, I don't want to interfere with the game, but I do want everyone who comes out to the ballpark to have fun. And look, let's face it: often the ballgame is not the most exciting thing that ever's happened.

MacNEIL: That's our summary of the news. Coming up, the governor of Iowa debates new threatened farm foreclosures with the head of the Department of Agriculture. Correspondent Tom Bearden reports from South Carolina on a man sentenced to die for a murder rape committed when he was a juvenile. Then four prominent Americans discuss where the country is and where it's going as we begin the year 1986. Calling In Loans

LEHRER: The governor of Iowa is an unhappy man today. The University of Iowa football team was beaten 45-28 by UCLA in the Rose Bowl and many Iowa farmers may be beaten by new federal farm foreclosure moves. It is the farm situation, not the football problem, we focus on tonight with Governor Terry Branstad, the Republican governor of Iowa, and Vance Clark, the head of the Federal Farmers Home Administration. It is his agency which will soon notify some 70,000 farmers nationwide that overdue loans must be updated to avoid foreclosure. The notifications end a moratorium on foreclosures ordered by federal courts two years ago. Governor Branstad joins us from Des Moines.

Governor, you were reported to be upset when told of the new foreclosure rules. Is that true?

Gov. TERRY BRANSTAD: It's a tragic irony that after the President signed the farm bill and the farm credit bill, giving some hope for stability in agriculture, that within two weeks we have the Farmers Home Administration ready to move forward and liquidate thousands of farmers. There are several thousand family farms in this state that would be directly affected by this action. I think it's a tragedy and I don't think it should go forward.

LEHRER: Mr. Clark, why have you made the decision to go ahead now and what exactly is involved?

VANCE CLARK: Well, timingwise it was really dictated by the courts. There was a class action suit beginning in South -- North Dakota two years ago. The court situation has now been resolved. We have published new servicing regulations as of November 1 that allows us to go forward with these new servicing regulations, and the mailing date has happened to pump out as December 31st, 1985. And so we are going forward from that beginning date.

LEHRER: The governor says that -- yeah, go ahead, Governor.

Gov. BRANSTAD: Well, the point is that the court has not approved these new rules. In fact, the state of North Dakota, the state of Minnesota and the state of Iowa are in court asking for a temporary injunction and a hearing date has been set for January 22nd on that hearing. I think it's a tragedy that they sent out these notices even before having a hearing on the new rules, which we feel are not legally adequate.

LEHRER: Mr. Clark?

Mr. CLARK: Governor, you and I talked about this a few weeks ago when I visited Des Moines. I know you're upset about that issue. I'm sure if I was in your state I would be upset as well. But I --

Gov. BRANSTAD: I told you at that time, however, that what you should not do is move forward at this time, that in fact we need some forebearance and that I was hopeful at that time the President would sign the farm bill and the farm credit bill. We were pleased that he did that. For the first time that was something positive for the farmers from this administration, and now you turn around without even having this thing decided by the courts and are moving forward and notifying thousands of farmers all across America that you're going to foreclose them and push them off their land.

Mr. CLARK: That's not the case, Governor, and I've told you that before. We are not foreclosing thousands upon thousands of farmers, in Iowa or any other state. Those are servicing options that are being offered to those borrowers. It's a notice that they are delinquent as of year end and asking them please come in, let us sit down and talk with you. There are seven options that are open to them, and I think there's going to be more forebearance and patience exhibited through our servicing requirements than perhaps you understand.

LEHRER: How many do you think will actually end up in foreclosure, Mr. Clark?

Mr. CLARK: There's no way to tell that issue. We are now publishing -- posting all of our payments as of year end. That list will be coming out of our computer center in St. Louis soon. It'll tell us how many are on that mailing list. There's no way to tell how many are going to be foreclosed. I suspect that it's a lower number, Governor, than you might suspect.

Gov. BRANSTAD: The information I have is, as of the end of September we had 3,600 delinquent farmers under Farmers Home in Iowa. And as you know, I've imposed a mortgage foreclosure moratorium in this state that affects other lenders. It doesn't affect the Farmers Home Administration. The Farmers Home Administration is supposed to be the lender of last resort, and I think it's a tragedy that this lender of last resort, which should be cooperating, is now moving forward and beginning the process to again foreclose on thousands of farm families all across America.

Mr. CLARK: I don't think we've ever played that role of thousands of farmers on foreclosure. We haven't done that, Governor, and I think you'll be surprised that we will --

Gov. BRANSTAD: Well, you haven't because the courts have prevented you from doing it, and now you've got new regulations, which have not been approved by the courts. We think they're inadequate. For instance, there's nine legal issues tobe decided in this request for a temporary injunction. You have several boxes that the farmer could check. But if you request for a deferral of that payment, it doesn't say what the requirements are to be eligible for that deferral. So we think it's legally inadequate.

LEHRER: What is going to be the attitude of your administration as they take up each one of these 70,000 cases? Are you going to be pushing for immediate payment and, if not, an immediate foreclosure? What are the time restraints and that sort of thing?

Mr. CLARK: Absolutely not. In fact, our regulations require that borrower to come in and talk to us, and we will discuss each of those options that are open to us.

LEHRER: But how much time does he or she have to come in to talk to you?

Mr. CLARK: Thirty days after receiving the notice they have to call us and make an appointment to do that.

LEHRER: All right, then what happens?

Gov. BRANSTAD: The experience in Iowa is that your offices can't handle 3,600 people coming in 30 days. We had to use state employees, National Guard and soil conversation employees to help the Farmers Home Administration with the processing of the loan guarantees for our farmers last spring. Farmers Home doesn't have the personnel and can't possibly handle it.

LEHRER: Is that true?

Mr. CLARK: That is true. We do not have a full staff. However, Governor, I want to tell you, we're going to an eight- or 10- or 12-hour day necessary to do that, in Iowa and every other state. We're going to muster the manpower wherever we can. You have volunteers this year again, I'll be happy to take them. If you can leave out the state -- the guard, but I'll take the rest of it.

Gov. BRANSTAD: We'll have people that'll volunteer to help you work with farmers to provide loan guarantees and to help farmers stay in farming, not to foreclose and push people out of agriculture.

LEHRER: All right, let's assume -- keep going on the scenario here -- let's assume that you get enough people to process these people within 30 days. What does a farmer have to do within 30 days? I mean, what happens then when he comes in?

Mr. CLARK: He comes in and talks about it, says, "You know, my operation will not cash-flow with the debt burden I have now. What can you do for me?" We can set aside some of that and say, "Okay, you will not have to make payments on this particular segment of your loan to Farmers Home for up to five years. No payments." If that will allow, that relief will allow him to cash-flow the rest of his operations, we're willing to do that. So I think there are several things that are of a relief nature that can be of great benefit to the American farmers.

LEHRER: Governor, why are you so sure --

Gov. BRANSTAD: Those things are already in --

LEHRER: Governor, I was just going -- why are you so sure that Mr. Clark's administration is going to foreclose on these 3,600 farmers in Iowa, say?

Gov. BRANSTAD: Well, our experience with the administration over the last two years has indicated that they have every intention of moving forward with foreclosures and they don't intend to provide forbearance. That's why the initial court injunction was received in North Dakota in the first place. That's why we're back in court trying to block it again. Farmers Home was out there foreclosing on people until the courts blocked it. Now they've come up with new regulations to start it up again, and our effort is to prevent this from happening and require them to use forbearance and in fact work with the farmers. They can work with the farmers without sending these notices out. This notice is the first step in foreclosure. That's what it is, pure and simple.

LEHRER: He's right, isn't he?

Mr. CLARK: Well, I don't know about the first step. That is the last thing that happens, you know. Here are great relief opportunities. That stuff -- the last thing that would happen would be foreclosure. In any situation, any prudent lender needs to notify his borrowers to say, you know, you are delinquent as of this date, let's talk about it. And that's really what we're doing: we're being prudent lenders.

LEHRER: But when you say you don't expect many of these 70,000 to end up in foreclosure, on what do you base that?

Mr. CLARK: Well, I got to tell you. We have some very dedicated people out there in our field, some 10,000 Farmers Home employees ready to work with our borrowers. And I think we've done a lot of training, and forbearance and patience certainly is on the top of our list, and we'll do anything to keep that farmer on that land. We don't want that land in inventory, and I've told you that before, Governor -- we have enough land in inventory, we don't need more.

Gov. BRANSTAD: Well, right now we have six times as much land on the market for sale in Iowa as the market would have in a normal situation. Land in this state dropped 30 last year, more than any year during the Great Depression. And now you're going to push thousands of additional acres on the market. Now, that's what's happening, and frankly, the courts have prevented you from doing it previously. Iowa, North Dakota, Minnesota are in for it again. We've requested a temporary injunction, and frankly I feel you should not move forward until the judge decides. The judge has not approved these new rules you've come up with.

LEHRER: But you are going to go ahead and move ahead, right?

Mr. CLARK: Well, certainly we are. And that's not -- you know, we have not sold a lot of land in Iowa, as the governor seems to have -- to say.

Gov. BRANSTAD: You couldn't, because the courts have prevented you. Now you're going to try to do it again, aren't you?

Mr. CLARK: No, we wouldn't. We hold that land off the market; we do not want to depress the land values, in Iowa or any other state.

LEHRER: Do you take the position that the courts have approved your plan? The governor says they haven't, that there's a temporary restraining order.

Mr. CLARK: As far as we're concerned, he has approved that. There is another suit being filed.

Gov. BRANSTAD: Now, wait a minute.

Mr. CLARK: Governor, I'm not aware of that. I have not seen it.

Gov. BRANSTAD: There is a request for a temporary injunction that was filed in December. It is set for a hearing on January 22nd, and that request has been -- the states of North Dakota, Minnesota and Iowa have joined in that request for the temporary injunction. Now, I would say that clearly has not been resolved, and I think any reasonable person would wait moving forward with this foreclosure action until that has been decided by the courts. That was the court that prevented the foreclosures in the first place.

LEHRER: But you are not going to wait?

Mr. CLARK: We have not received that injunction he's talking about, you know. If we receive that, certainly we would wait. We will abide by the court.

Gov. BRANSTAD: No, wait a minute. The court has set the injunction down for a hearing on January 22nd. It may well be after you send out all these notices and go to all this expense and put people through all the mental anguish of receiving this notice, that the injunction will be again issued and they'll be prevented. But this is the kind of uncooperative nature we've received from the Farmers Home Administration time and time again throughout the last two years. We need cooperation; we don't need foreclosures.

Mr. CLARK: The governor has our cooperation. Now, let me tell you, those notices will not be mailed either, probably until after January 20th, because the mere paperwork processes are going to take probably the last week of January before they're even placed in the mail.

LEHRER: Okay.

Gov. BRANSTAD: Well, will you wait until after the court decides on the temporary injunction on January 22nd before you move forward? That seems reasonable to me.

Mr. CLARK: If we mail the 23rd, you would be happy, Governor.

Gov. BRANSTAD: Well, I think the court may well decide that your rules are not adequate and I think you should wait and not move forward prior to that time.

LEHRER: All right, we'll see.

Gov. BRANSTAD: Would you do that?

LEHRER: Mr. Clark?

Mr. CLARK: Twenty-third? I'd be happy to wait until January 23rd.

LEHRER: Okay, that's a deal, we got a deal there, gentlemen.

Gov. BRANSTAD: Okay, that sounds good. We'll wait and see what the court decides.

LEHRER: All right, gentlemen. Thank you both very much. Robin?

MacNEIL: Still to come on the NewsHour, Tom Bearden reports on the controversy in South Carolina over the death sentence passed on a man for a murder rape committed when he was 17. Then four Americans prominent in different fields share their thoughts on America and the world at the beginning of 1986. Death for a Juvenile?

LEHRER: Next, a story from South Carolina about the case of Terry Roach. Roach will be executed January 10th unless Governor Dick Riley intervenes. The issue is the far-reaching one of just punishment for juveniles who commit very adult crimes. Our report is by correspondent Tom Bearden.

TOM BEARDEN [voice-over]: James Terry Roach has been on death row in this South Carolina penitentiary for eight years. He's been sentenced to die in the electric chair for a crime committed when he was 17 years old.

[on camera] It was October 1977. Teenagers Tommy Taylor and Carlotta Hartness came here to the Polo Road Park on the outskirts of Columbia. According to court testimony, another car containing three men pulled up and parked next to them. The next day police found Tommy Taylor's body slumped over the wheel of his car; he had been shot three times. Carlotta Hartness' body was found in the woods some distance away. She had been repeatedly shot, raped, and her body was mutilated. Carlotta Hartness was 14 years old. The age of the victim and the violence of the crime outraged this community.

[voice-over] Police quickly arrested Terry Roach and two others for the crime. Sixteen-year-old Ronnie Mahaffey turned state's evidence. He told prosecutors that he and Roach had followed the lead of 24-year-old J.C. Shaw in the commission of the crime. Mahaffey said Roach obeyed Shaw's instructions in shooting both Taylor and Hartness. Mahaffey also revealed Shaw had raped and murdered another woman only a week earlier. Less than two months later, Shaw and Roach had both entered guilty pleas and were sentenced to death. Mahaffey got a life sentence. Shaw was executed last January. Roach's case has been under continuous appeal ever since. Defense attorneys have raised a host of issues in their efforts to obtain a new trial. They say Roach's original attorney was incompetent and was later disbarred for drug trafficking. Because of that, they contend the judge who imposed the death penalty was not made aware of several crucial mitigating circumstances, circumstances they say might have led to a life sentence. Roach's mother, Faye, has been diagnosed as having Huntington's chorea, a debilitating and eventually fatal brain disease.

FAYE ROACH, mother: He's a good boy and I love him.

BEARDEN: Do you think he did what they say he did?

Ms. ROACH: No, I don't.

BEARDEN: Why not?

Ms. ROACH: He couldn't have done that.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: Three generations of the family have suffered from Huntington's chorea. University of Louisville neurologist Dr. William Olson examined Roach on Monday and concluded Roach has the disease. He says that condition, coupled with an IQ that classifies Roach as borderline mentally retarded, raises serious questions about whether he understood what was happening during the crime.

Dr. WILLIAM OLSON, neurologist: Now, starting out with somebody who at best was 11 years old mentally at the time that this happened, we can lower that age to maybe as far as you want. And I guess one of the issues here in terms of clemency is that even though at the time he was 17 years old, which in most societies is a grown man, in fact his mind was basically that of a child, given all of these other influences. And I think what the governor's going to have to face is that, you know, are we really willing to put to death someone like that, regardless of what their body is, you know, if their mind is a lot less.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: Diane Follingstad is a clinical psychologist hired by the defense team to examine Roach. She agrees with the defense contention that Roach would have been easily dominated by a strong personality like Shaw's.

DIANE FOLLINGSTAD, clinical psychologist: First of all, if he was dependent on someone to take care of him, then he would not assert what he thought was right, even if he could figure out what was right. I think that he has real difficulty even being able to piece together what some of the more sophisticated ideas of right and wrong actually mean, and so I do believe he's very easily led.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: Roach's attorneys have also taken the unusual course of appealing to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, contending Roach's execution would violate international agreements prohibiting juvenile executions. Lawyers Grady Query and Mike Farrell represent Terry Roach. Query says their efforts to secure clemency are not what he termed a bleeding-heart appeal to spare a life without reason.

GRADY QUERY, defense lawyer: Well, he was actually present during the commission of a terrible crime. There's no question about that and there's no question that that -- that he is responsible and has guilt for that. There is a great deal of question as to the degree of his participation. We feel that we could prove without any question that his participation was relatively minor, at least when compared with that of Shaw, and that he in fact did not take life, nor did he intend to take life.

JAMES ANDERS, prosecutor: It's uncontradicted as far as I know that he shot both the young Taylor boy and the Hartness girl. It's uncontradicted.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: Solicitor James Anders prosecuted the original case. He rejects all the defense arguments.

Mr. ANDERS: He has a normal IQ. He had no major deficiencies. He knew right from wrong and he knew what he was doing at that time. So I'm not impressed with any arguments of his mental stability at all. I do want you to know, however, that in the criminal law we rarely deal with people that are normal in all respects. We deal with people that vary from the norm. We deal with people that are mean. And as far as mean people, Terry Roach, in my 12 years as the chief prosecutor from this jurisdiction, is about the meanest person that I've ever laid my eyes on. No one has bought those arguments, all the way from the trial court through the appellate courts to the United States Supreme Court twice, no one has bought those arguments. The truth is, he was competent, he was mean, he was cruel and he participated in two murders. That's the truth.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: Lawyer David Bruck represents a dozen men on South Carolina's death row. He is a well-known opponent of capital punishment, particularly for juveniles. He's conducted extensive research into the case of George Stinney, the youngest person to be executed in this century. Stinney was 14 when he was electrocuted in South Carolina in 1944.

DAVID BRUCK, attorney: Terry Roach was involved in a very brutal murder, a murder that really blighted the lives of several families. And it's the kind of crime that just sort of tears at the heart of anybody that cares about it. Those are the sorts of crimes that sometimes make us respond in ways that we won't be proud of when we look back later, just like very few people in this state are proud of what we did in the George Stinney case.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: No one disputes the fact that the overwhelming majority of people in South Carolina support the death penalty, including many clergymen. But some of them are raising both legal and moral objections to its use for minors. Reverent Bill Bouknight is a friend of the governor. He's written him urging commutation of Roach's sentence.

Rev. BILL BOUKNIGHT, minister: When I talk with Christians, many of whom are in favor of the death penalty, they will pull out a verse from the Old Testament. But I have never yet had one of them come to me and say, "I think Jesus would be in favor of it for the following reasons." Never have.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: And Bruck says well-established international law forbids juvenile executions.

Mr. BRUCK: Even countries like Libya, Russia, South Africa, China, Iraq, all have laws against the execution of people who were at the age that Terry Roach was when he committed his crime, that is, under the age of 18. It's inconceivable to me that the United States, which stands as a beacon of human rights to the rest of the world, is going to continue on this course very much longer. So the question isn't, should we execute juveniles; it's should we execute two or three or six or 10 more juveniles before we stop?

Mr. ANDERS: Society has the right to punish anyone who doesn't agree with it. We could not live, it would seem to me, in an ordered society. If we don't punish criminals, how are the rest of us to live? I don't advocate at all, I don't think you'd find any person in their right mind advocating that every person 15, 16, 17, 18 years of age should be put in the electric chair. The penalty has to fit the crime, and if the crime is heinous enough, then the punishment should be the ultimate.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: There is organized citizen opposition to capital punishment. The South Carolina Coalition Against the Death Penalty staged several candlelight vigils. But there have also been counter-demonstrations. Opponents fear if Roach is electrocuted it will open a floodgate of juvenile executions, not only in South Carolina but across the nation. Bruck doesn't think so. He says statistics indicate death sentences are becoming increasingly rare, and Reverend Bouknight thinkspublic disgust will eventually stop them once and for all.

Rev. BOUKNIGHT: I think that gradually the people of South Carolina, who are sensitive, intelligent, people who are predominantly Christian, I think they're going to get their craw filled with killing. I think they're going to get sicker and sicker of it, and there will come a time when they will have had enough. And so until that time I think it's important for people of conscience to just keep speaking out.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: While the experts debate the issue, the Roach family waits.

JAMES ROACH, father: Been like hell. I mean, to just put it in words -- I don't want to go to hell, but it couldn't be much worser than what I been living in.

BEARDEN: What do you do if the appeal is turned down?

Mr. ROACH: I guess they might have to make two funerals, three funerals. 'Cause I know she's going. So I'll probably go too. I've been telling myself that, trying to adjust myself but [unintelligible]. They want an eye for an eye, well, they're going to get that part of us, 'cause they going to get three of them, 'cause I can't make it. I can hardly make it now. And I know she ain't going to make it.

BEARDEN [voice-over]: The families of the victims of this crime declined to express their feelings. A bill is now pending before the South Carolina legislature to ban capital punishment for minors. Back to the Future

MacNEIL: For most Americans, this is the first working day of the New Year, 1986. Before the new year stock-taking mood quite wears off, we wanted to have a look at where 1985 has brought us and where we may be headed in the New Year. To stimulate our own stock-taking, we have four Americans prominent in very different fields. All four have appeared on the NewsHour in the past. At 28, Peter Sellars is sometimes called the wunderkind of the American theater. He has a reputation for innovation, flamboyance, even brashness. Last March he took over as director of the American National Theatre in Washington. Another whose style provokes controversy is James Watt. As Mr. Reagan's first interior secretary, Watt's opinions on everything from the environment to the Beach Boys kept him in the headlines. He's now on the lecture circuit and promoting his book, Conscience of a Conservative. Not a conservative, but equally outspoken, is Eleanor Holmes Norton, civil rights activist and head of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission under President Carter. She now teaches law at Georgetown University in Washington. Finally we have Bob Kerrey, governor of Nebraska, who recently surprised everyone who thought he had bigger, even presidential, political ambitions by announcing he would not seek a second term. Governor Kerrey was a wounded hero in Vietnam and Congressional Medal of Honor winner who became an antiwar activist. He joins us tonight from Los Angeles.

Eleanor Holmes Norton, starting with the ladies, let's look back at 1985. How was it a significant year for Americans?

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON: Well, it was a significant year in many ways. I must tell you that there was an almost troubling stability about America domestically. I mean, it is an America that apparently had learned to live with 7 unemployment as normal. Perhaps by 1990 we will consider 10 unemployment normal. It is an America which is joyful that it came out and continues to recover from the worst recession since the Great Depression, and yet our economy is in long-term decline, with extraordinary trade deficits and essentially unable to compete with the robust economies of Asia, for example, and some in Latin America. On the international scene there was some movement forward, in particular in two areas. The American people rose up on their hind legs and demanded that our government separate itself from the policies of South Africa in no uncertain terms and moved our President, who said he would never sign a bill for economic sanctions to do just that. And of course we are all abundantly grateful that in the summit we are back to where we were, let's say, 15 years ago and no longer daring the Russians to do whatever they do and wait to see what we shall do in return. And that's the kind of world it's become, a world which is not moving forward in a progressive manner very much anymore.

MacNEIL: Governor Kerrey, how was 1985 significant to you?

Gov. BOB KERREY: Well, coming from Nebraska, we watched the nation essentially ignore the liquidation of food producers and to simply say that that's the natural course of things and there's nothing we can do to reverse it, which is to essentially ignore history, to ignore our own efforts, successful efforts, and in developing the territories in the first place. There's almost an attitude that says, sure you've got a death in the family, but don't mourn them; sure you've got somebody that's in trouble, but don't worry about it because we've got most of the nation in recovery and most of the nation in pretty good shape, and after all, these people borrowed money when they shouldn't have. We find ourselves in grief and find ourselves not having an awful lot of people willing to share it with us.

MacNEIL: James Watt, 1985, how significant for Americans?

JAMES WATT: 1985 was an indecisive year. We have the problems that my colleagues have talked about, we've had opportunities to correct them; and yet we have lacked the courage to make the changes that I think really ought to be brought to bring a better and sounder America, to bring more strength to our people, not only here in America but around the world. Much needs to be done, and it's going to take courageous leadership, it's going to take determination, and we haven't seen it in 1985 and I look forward to a better 1986.

MacNEIL: And Peter Sellars, 1985 from your point of view.

PETER SELLARS: It was a very tough year. Culturally a kind of low-water mark. Everybody's thinking short-term. There's a kind of astonishing individualism which is returning that could become a very dangerous selfishness. Right now what we need to do is think in terms of 15 years away from the end of the century, which means that we have a lot to do in terms of thinking with great generosity. Because now we begin to be in a position of some strength in the world, in a certain respect, but with that now comes a return to the values of genuine generosity that this country has represented fold.

MacNEIL: Let me ask each of you, perhaps again with you, Eleanor Holmes Norton, because you mentioned the summit meeting -- does the world feel a safer place to you at the end of 1985?

Ms. NORTON: It does to me. The bellicose talk is no longer the rule of the day. Instead the President has been moved, I think by public opinion, to exchange greetings with Gorbachev, indeed on television to his people, and Gorbachev to ours. That's a step forward. The problem with that step forward is that it takes us back to the baby steps we were at before SALT I. We're back to where we were where we're trying to move forward to perhaps another agreement, and we're only in the stage of exchanges. That is a whole lot better than screaming to the other side that they are an evil empire. You don't negotiate with people when you throw pejorative terms that way. So I do feel safer, and I think it is because everyone is so happy that those kind of epithets are no longer being thrown, that we have not pressed our President to move in the truly aggressive and courageous direction he must in order to make up for lost time in the terrible arms race.

MacNEIL: How do you feel about that, James Watt?

Sec. WATT: I'm smiling. It is a safer place because we're a stronger country, but it's not as strong as it should be. We have the Qaddafis, we have terrorism that is a serious problem. And while we sit here, our lives are more threatened as Americans around the world today than they have been in many times because we have not always shown the strength. And while Mrs. Norton speaks nicely about how nice it is to talk and we're all proud of what the President did, you don't talk to terrorists. And we've got to show a firm resolve and a determination to protect the dignity of all people around the world and not tolerate the terroristic activities that have gone on and been condoned by Gorbachev and those type of people. It's time for us to stand up and be strong. And talking is nice if you talk from strength, and we've got to strengthen our positions.

MacNEIL: Governor Kerrey, safer because we're stronger?

Gov. KERREY: No. I mean, I don't feel safer. I'm glad that James Watt feels safer, particularly now that he --

Sec. WATT: Well, now wait, Governor, let's stop right there. I said because of terrorism we're not safer and we haven't been strong enough. So --

Gov. KERREY: I appreciate -- Jim, you've been on a lecture tour and you're still interrupting me. It's my turn. I'm saying that I don't feel safer today than I did five years ago. If you'd told me that in the United States of America that we'd established a goal of having people that are able to speak other languages and that we have moved aggressively to take our people into the world, I'd feel safer. If you told me that we had an effective response to Communism that included negotiations with nations like the People's Republic of China instead of pointing to Grenada and Nicaragua as our effective response, I'd feel safer. If you took the strength of the American people, their ability to produce money, their ability to help themselves and challenge those people, and said to those people that we're going to try to engage the world as human beings, then I'd feel safer. But to build a wall around ourselves with a $300 billion fort, I don't feel safer, because we cannot build that wall tall enough to make ourselves safe.

MacNEIL: How do these ideas resonate with you in the cultural community?

Mr. SELLARS: Well, because there can be no safety. It's too late in the century for that. The question is, will we lose a city this year, and will finally losing a city cause people to think very seriously about the nature of the -- I know it's very complex --

MacNEIL: Lose a city how?

Mr. SELLARS: When finally -- you know, we lose power in our cities from time to time. I mean, finally one of these nuclear missiles -- sooner or later something has to go, and it's a question of how soon. No, we're not living in a period -- knowing that we have -- we're sitting on top of the kind of seething capacity for destruction, the question is what in our final moments can be our last acts of kindness on the face of the earth -- how noble can we finally appear in our last moments. You know, what kind of hope may we allow ourselves? Culturally, it's a really tough thing to fightagainst, because the level of dispair is so deep that the cultural result is that people go to these lousy movies, feel-good movies which lie to them and tell them that everything's better than it maybe is.

MacNEIL: Just looking historically at this country, different periods have had different names applied to them, like the quiet of the Eisenhower years and things like that. How would you describe the phase this country is in right now?

Mr. SELLARS: Holding its breath. The suspense is terrific. For a while, there's this sense of some kind of renewed prosperity. There's of course simultaneously a sense that the bottom's going right out from under us.

MacNEIL: Governor Kerrey, how would you describe the phase we're in now?

Gov. KERREY: Well, I think there's a lot of personal confidence. I mean, I am amazed when I see individuals, the extent to which their faith and their hope and their work and their humor will carry them into the future; the extent to which that they'll work right now for the things in which they believe. I feel today that the American people have as much potential as they've ever had. Better educated, better able to confront that future, more willing to share -- they just need to be challenged from time to time. I'm not amused by our tendency to borrow more than we ought to. I'm not amused by our description of ourselves as conservative. I'm certainly not amused by the way that we tell other people to live a life that's different than what we do ourselves.

MacNEIL: What do you mean by that?

Gov. KERREY: Well, I was gripped with terror when I saw Jim Buckley go down to Mexico City to describe to those people how they ought to control their population with economic development and the rhythm method. I'd ask Jim Buckley if he actually expects the American people to control our population with economic development and the rhythm method. We haven't used it. We're hypocritical that way. And unfortunately we seem to be terrorized ourselves by the frothing radical right wing of our political parties in this country, and we avoid those sorts of things that we know really to be the case. We advise Brazil to balance their budget, and yet we continue our budget 23 out of balance. Now, we're telling the world to do something that we ourselves aren't doing -- at least it seems to me that our President and our executive branch is.

MacNEIL: Let's move it on. Jim?

LEHRER: All right. Jim Watt, you said what this country needs is courageous leadership. Describe courageous leadership.

Sec. WATT: Men and women who will stand up and speak to the value system that is so critical, that several members of this panel have been talking about.

LEHRER: But to say what?

Sec. WATT: And not to flinch. We need to build those public policies that will strengthen the family unit, the work ethic and faith in America, and on that foundation we can go. But when you don't have leaders that will stand and help the farm situation, eliminate discrimination, reduce federal spending that is not helpful, that's not being courageous.

LEHRER: Do you have a model in mind when you say everybody should be -- we need courageous leaders? Do you have a model from history that comes to your mind?

Sec. WATT: I don't have -- I cannot personify that for you right now. We need courageous leaders in the entertainment world, the educational world, not just in the political world -- across the board. And the values that the governor's speaking about are there with the American people; they need the leadership that will bring it out.

LEHRER: Do you see that as aproblem, Ms. Norton?

Ms. NORTON: I must say I agree with Jim Watt on this. I think this is a period characterized by a thirst for leadership, and one of the reasons I think that people embrace Ronald Reagan regardless of his politics is that they somehow see in him that -- some fulfillment of their thirst for leadership.

Sec. WATT: Yes.

Ms. NORTON: My notion of leadership, I must say, would be leadership with real substance, the kind of leadership that John F. Kennedy provided, the kind of leadership that FDR provided. I don't happen to think that the President provides that kind of leadership; I think his leadership is cosmetic. But it is -- but the people want leadership, definitive leadership, so badly that regardless of where they stand on the issues they seem to embrace him because he represents leadership. Not only, it seems to me, is strong leadership missing in politics -- I agree with Jim Watt. If you look at the major institutions in American life, you will see replicated there what we see in politics -- the absence of the kind of leadership that can galvanize and move people wherever you might want to move them. Jim may want to move them somewhere different from where I want to move them, but I say that neither on the conservative side or on the liberal side today in America is there that kind of leadership, and the people really want it and have not found it yet.

LEHRER: Do you agree, Bob Kerrey?

Gov. KERREY: Well, I think the people are looking for leadership, but I think they actually respond to leadership in an odd sort of way. I mean, I think they're getting strong leadership in their families right now. I think you do see very strong parents exerting authority -- not authoritarian things over their children, but exerting authority, picking up the values that they believe in, and in fact, are being rewarded for it. I don't think there's a shortage of leaders right now; I think that there are certainly some examples of people that we wish would be stronger, and certainly we see that we dream and look into the past and wish we had John Kennedy, wish we had FDR, and if you're a Republican, why, maybe you wish we had Calvin Coolidge back again. But we sometimes take our memory and forget that those people at the time were being criticized for not being leaders either. We sometimes I think fail to recognize a leader when they're right in front of us, simply because we don't agree with them, simply because they aren't perfect, simply because they don't quite match our image of what our leaders used to be. I think we're too critical of lack of leadership because I think, as I look around me, I see lots of people leading, lots of good, strong, solid people that are expressing the sort of things that I like and that encourage me about the future.

LEHRER: Give me an example of somebody in American life right now that you consider a really strong leader.

Gov. KERREY: Well, I like Dick Lamm in Colorado. I don't have to go too far as a matter of fact. Dick Lamm is confronting the future in a rather uncomfortable way at times for us, but he's simply taking the numbers, he's simply taking the evidence, he's simply taking what he sees and he says this is what I think's going to happen to us. He's predicting based upon facts, he's predicting based upon what he sees, not as a result of some pessimistic feeling or some sort of Pollyanna feeling on the other end, but based upon what he thinks is right and wrong. So you see a lot, as a matter of fact, on the political scene. I see educators, teachers and superintendents, teachers and principals, that are confronting, trying to make better schools. Really, in my judgment, there is no shortage of leadership. We sometimes expect, I think, too much of our leaders.

LEHRER: Peter Sellars, are you looking to be led by someone who's not there yet?

Mr. SELLARS: That's a tough one, because right now, by whom? The difficulty is that, you know, I spend my time doing plays by Shakespeare about very, very great leaders who also turn out to be somewhat human. And I guess we all have to be, finally. But the question is, you know, how great does great get? You know, when can there be a little stature? When can there be more than a press release? When do we see that something is ennobled? And right now I do think the issue is education this year which has to move forward. We have to face a country that's going to become more complex, not simpler, and we have to admit that fact and understand that a greater understanding of complexity is the solution, not a refusal to face it and instead a sort of obnoxious simplification of everything. It's that great Einstein thing: everything should be stated just as simply as possible and no simpler. And when we learn that, maybe we'll be ready to face it.

LEHRER: Yeah. Eleanor Holmes Norton, Governor Kerrey says there are leaders out there; you're just not listening.

Ms. NORTON: Well, I expect a governor to say that, with all due respect, and I don't think we have a dearth of leadership. That was not my point. My point was, I think, somewhat more complex. I asked the governor who can find me leadership that can in fact galvanize people toward the future across racial lines, across class lines, across geographic lines. That is the kind of leadership I am talking about.

LEHRER: Is there leadership possible that would get Eleanor Holmes Norton and James Watt to work together one joint purpose? Is that kind of leadership even possible in this political world?

Sec. WATT: Definitely possible.

LEHRER: But what kind of person would it have to be?

Sec. WATT: One who is committed to a value system that will fight for the system that we've already expressed and shared views on, regardless of the cost to their personal popularity or their personal image. But to put people and the dignity of the individual above their political image. That's where the American people are hungry for that. They want to do what's right, and yet they see the political leadership squaring off and posturing and cancelling each other out. So we lack the leadership to take the nation forward because Tip O'Neill cancels out Ronald Reagan, and that's unfortunate for America.

LEHRER: Governor Kerrey, if through some magic -- you're shaking your head. Did you want to say --

Gov. KERREY: Well, I mean, I just -- I look around me and I see extraordinary leaders, people that make me laugh, people that make me cry, people that make me feel good, I'm glad what they're doing. Eleanor Holmes Norton may not know them. Perhaps I'm going to have to point a few of them out to her. It's not because I'm a governor, by the way; it's because I'm a human being and I like them, and I like what they're doing. I'm not depressed at all by the lack of leadership. In fact, if you sit around and wait for a leader, then what sort of people are we? The fact is, we as individuals have to confront that reality. We as individuals have to look at the contradictions and decide what we think is real and not real, and not wait for somebody else to tell us what it is. We as individual people have to exert the determination and have the courage to say whatwe think is right or wrong, and not sit around and complain, well, how we'd speak out more often if somebody'd just tell us what to do. That's not the nature of the American people, and I'm not discouraged at all by the lack of evidence of leadership, because I see it in abundance.

Ms. NORTON: Well, Governor, it's interesting that I would have the greatest difference with a member of my own party. Surely leadership is not about telling people what to do. Martin Luther King didn't tell us what to do when he led us.

Sec. WATT: Right.

Ms. NORTON: But he provided magnificent leadership. We do lack, it seems to me, the kind of leadership that can make us move through this transition moment. And that's what it is: it's a watershed moment in which we don't quite know where we're going to end. It is --

LEHRER: Right now.

Ms. NORTON: Right this moment.

LEHRER: 1986.

Ms. NORTON: We are not yet -- we have not yet in either party produced the kind of leadership that can lead us to the future. The fact is that we are at the end of the 20th century. We are virtually in the 21st century. We are at a moment that is absolutely historic -- the transition from the old industrial order to a new technical order which will change everything in its wake, from the way in which the family is organized to the way in which work itself is organized. The fact is that we have produced a thousand leaders in one way or the other who understand that all of this is going on. We have failed to produce -- and I'm going to finish this, Governor --

Gov. KERREY: I'll bet you are.

Ms. NORTON: We have failed to produce the kind of leadership that can galvanize us all to move forward. Obviously I'm not talking about --

Gov. KERREY: Hey, I'm not a piece of metal, I'm not waiting to be galvanized, I don't need to be galvanized.

Ms. NORTON: We're waiting for you to galvanize us, Governor.

Gov. KERREY: No, it's not surprising that two Democrats should disagree on this by the way, because we always tend to devour our young. We're not short, in my judgment, of leaders. And in fact if you cut the statement that you just made, -- we can't do anything until we have a leader, we can't respond and go into the future -- the conclusion of that is that we ought to despair. Look at the creativity of the American people. Look at the business leaders in this country right now. Look at the educators in this nation. I don't see any shortage of talent. I don't see any shortage of creativity.

Sec. WATT: I think Ms. Norton is making a powerful good point, Jim, and I want to ally myself with her totally in this argument. The American people are much stronger than the collective leadership that they now have. The American people have a great heart and a good determination. And hopefully the leadership will be courageous enough to bring about what the two of us here in Washington are talking about and the Governor will join us.

Gov. KERREY: Well, stay back there in Washington because there's plenty of leaders out here in the country. [crosstalk]

Ms. NORTON: -- come here to Washington, Governor.

LEHRER: Peter Sellars?

Mr. SELLARS: Yes.

LEHRER: You wanted to say something.

Mr. SELLARS: Well, just the responsibility for leadership does begin at home, and that's the main point, and that's why one hopes in the coming year for a cultural life that has a kind of renewed intensity and depth of perception, because the question is how as individuals can each of us begin to respond more hugely to the world, which is right now attacking us at every level. And we hope that we'll be ready for it, every single one of us as individuals in our own hearts and in our own homes. And that's where it starts, and the rest is going to be gravy.

LEHRER: Okay, speaking of gravy, I thoroughly enjoyed this. Thank you, Peter Sellars in New York, Governor Bob Kerrey in Los Angeles, Eleanor Holmes Norton and James Watt here in Washington.

Gov. KERREY: Happy New Year.

LEHRER: Thank you, same to you.

MacNEIL: It is time for tonight's Lurie cartoon, and you'll see what's on his mind.

[Ranon Lurie cartoon -- world-globe cat naps outside "terror" mousehole; mouse becomes monster as the cat sleeps]

MacNEIL: Once again, the main stories of the day. Rioting prisoners in West Virginia have agreed to release all their hostages. Another victim of the airport terror raid in Rome has died. Violence took five more lives in South Africa.

Good night, Jim.

LEHRER: Good night, Robin. We'll see you tomorrow night. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.