The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

JIM LEHRER: Good evening. I'm Jim Lehrer. On the NewsHour tonight, the President's news conference and new appointments, analysis by Mark Shields & Paul Gigot, an update on the affirmative action vote in California, and some new word on old humankind. It all follows our summary of the news this Friday. NEWS SUMMARY

JIM LEHRER: President Clinton today announced more members of his team for the second term: Chicago lawyer Bill Daley to be secretary of commerce, Congressman Bill Richardson to be United Nations ambassador, and Gene Sperling to head his national economic council. The President also said he had asked Attorney General Janet Reno, Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, HHS Secretary Donna Shalala, EPA Administrator Carol Browner, and Trade Rep. Sharlene Barshefsky to stay on. We'll have more on this story right after the News Summary. A new secretary-general of the United Nations was selected today. He is Kofi Annan of Ghana, the UN undersecretary for peacekeeping operations. The U.N. Security Council is expected to give him formal approval tonight. Annan was elected by the 15 members of the Security Council after France lifted its objections to him. He will replace Boutros Boutros-Ghali, whose term ends December 31st. After that preliminary vote this afternoon, U.S. Ambassador Madeleine Albright congratulated Annan and praised Boutros-Ghali.

MADELEINE ALBRIGHT, Secretary of State-Elect: I am personally delighted that after a long process, the Security Council has succeeded in coming to a consensus to recommend Kofi Annan as the next secretary-general to the General Assembly. I also would like to say that the United States and I personally are very grateful for the job and the hard work that Secretary-General Boutros-Ghali has, in fact, performed during his term. He is a renowned international statesman and has made his mark in history.

JIM LEHRER: As Amb. Albright said, once the Security Council formally approves Annan, his name will be referred to the General Assembly for ratification. In Central Africa today, Tanzanian troops stopped thousands of Rwandan Hutu refugees from moving into the Tanzanian bush. The refugees had fled four large camps yesterday and moved deeper into Tanzania, instead of toward the Rwandan border 15 miles to the East. Aid officials said they were herded by armed Hutu militants, who feared retribution for the 1994 massacre of minority Tutsis in Rwanda. The Israeli cabinet moved today to strengthen the Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. Israelis who move there will pay less income tax; businesses will receive grants equal to at least 20 percent of their investments. There are currently about 145,000 Jewish settlers in those areas amid 2 million Palestinians. A spokesman for Palestinian Leader Yasser Arafat said the decision was a violation of the Israeli-Palestinian peace accords. On the Serbia story today, President Milosevic denied he improperly overturned recent local election results. He said so in a published letter to Secretary of State Christopher. Milosevic said the vote was fair, and he invited the international monitors to visit Serbia to investigate. At the State Department today, Spokesman Nicholas Burns had this to say about the letter.

NICHOLAS BURNS, State Department Spokesman: President Milosevic in his letter fails to address in any serious and committed way the substantive concerns that the United States has raised over the last several weeks concerning the annulment of the municipal elections and the subsequent abuse by the Serbian police of many of the demonstrators. The United States rejects President Milosevic legalistic arguments in this letter that try to whitewash the simple truth. There has been a blatant disregard of the democratic will of the Serbian people. And the Serbian government has annulled elections which now should be restored, which the opposition clearly won in 15 of 18 constituencies.

JIM LEHRER: In Belgrade today, there was another demonstration against the Milosevic government. Two hundred thousand protesters staged a 12-mile march across the capital city. Milosevic said the opposition party organizers of the marches were committing political terrorism. The first conference of the World Trade Organization ended in Singapore today, with a deal on technology. Trade ministers from 28 countries agreed to cut import taxes on computers and hundreds of other high-tech products beginning next year. The so-called information technology agreement would eliminate tariffs on computer-related products by the end of the century. And that's it for the News Summary tonight. Now it's on to more nominations to the Clinton team, Shields & Gigot, affirmative action in California, and an update on where we came from. FOCUS - NEW FACES

JIM LEHRER: President Clinton did announce more new members of his second term team this afternoon. He then answered reporters' questions. Here are some excerpts.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: Today, I am pleased to nominate Bill Daley of Chicago as the new secretary of commerce, a man of rare effectiveness, a longtime civic leader, a prominent attorney and business leader. As special counsel to the President for the North American Free Trade Agreement, he coordinated our administration's efforts to forge a broad bipartisan coalition to pass that landmark trade agreement. He embodies the values of hard work and fair play, faith, and family that will serve him in very good stead as a secretary of commerce. When I took office four years ago, I established for the first time a national economic council to coordinate economic policy, to make sure we get the best advice, and a range of options, as well as new ideas. Today, I am pleased to appoint Gene Sperling to be the assistant to the President for economic policy and director of the National Economic Council. Gene was my chief economic policy adviser in the 1992 campaign. He's been deputy director of the NEC since its creation. He has been central to the development of our budget, our tax, our education, our training policies. I rely on him heavily, on his knowledge and skill, his mind, and his heart. As all of you know, he certainly shows that the work ethic is still alive and well in America. Indeed, I made him promise as a condition of getting this appointment that he would adopt a dramatic new idea in the next few years: Sleep. We know that our economic future is increasingly dependent upon mastering the challenges of the global economy. Today, I am pleased to announce that I am appointing Dan Turillo to be assistant to the President for international economic policy. In his job, Dan will report to the heads of both NEC and the NSC, bringing, thus, even closer coordination between our foreign and our economic teams. He's represented the United States around the world as we have negotiated trade agreements as assistant secretary of state and deputy director of the NEC. I'm also pleased to announce the completion of our foreign policy team. Our ambassador to the United Nations must be someone who can give a voice to America's interests and ideals around the world, someone who can work to reform the United Nations so that it costs less and is prepared to meet is new challenges, someone who can not only talk but who can also act affectively. All Americans have watched admiringly as Bill Richardson has undertaken the toughest and most delicate diplomatic efforts around the world, from North Korea to Iraq. Just this week, Congressman Richardson was huddled in a rebel chieftain's hut in Sudan, eating barbecued goat and negotiating the freedom of three hostages. Today, I am proud to nominate him to be our next ambassador to the United Nations, to serve in my cabinet, and as a principal on our foreign policy team. In addition to his already long list of foreign policy achievements, he has represented the people of Northern New Mexico for 14 years now as a member of the House Democratic Leadership and is one of our nation's most prominent and proud Hispanic leaders. Mr. Fournier.

RON FOURNIER, Associated Press: Mr. President, looking beyond today's announcements in your second term, can you tell us how you hope history will judge your eight years in office, what single accomplishment you'd like to be remembered for. And along those lines, would you share your thinking with us on the specific roles the First Lady will play in the next four years.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: That's enough for an hour. You've heard me say that I believe this time is most closely paralleled in our history to about 100 years ago when then we moved from the farm to the factory, from the rural areas to the city. We became primarily an urban manufacturing country. We are now a global leader, and the basis of all economic activity is increasingly knowledge and information and technology. I would like to be remembered as the President who prepared America for that future, who prepared America for the 21st century, where we had opportunity available to all Americans who were responsible enough to exercise it, where we lived with the diversity of this country and the diversity of the world on terms of respect and honor, giving everyone a chance to live up to the fullest of his or her own ability in building a stronger sense of community, instead of becoming more divided, as so many countries are, and where we continued to be the indispensable nation in the world for peace and freedom and prosperity. That is my vision of America in the 21st century. And when I'm finished, I hope people will add up all the things we did and say that is what they achieved. I have nothing to add to what I've already said about the First Lady, except that the State Department has asked her to undertake more efforts around the world, following up on the Beijing Conference, like the one she did in Northern Thailand recently, speaking out on behalf of the human rights dimensions of women and young girls around the world. And I expect she will do more of that. And I expect she will continue her interests in children and families and related issues here at home. But I have nothing else to say beyond that.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN: Mr. President, with Congress coming back into a new session, there seems to be indications they will take up two issues which are contentious, which you have opposed in the past, an amendment to balance the budget, a constitutional amendment to balance the budget, because I guess concern a few weeks ago amongst some of your aids by suggesting you could live with a constitutional amendment to balance the budget, and secondly, legislation that would ban a late-term abortion procedure, known as partial birth abortion. Could you tell us exactly what kind of language you could accept on both of those issues that would allow you to go forward and support those matters.

PRESIDENT CLINTON: Well, there are two different things here. First of all, what I said on the balanced budget, I don't think-- let me try to be clear here so I won't be misunderstood. I do not believe it is good policy or needed to have a constitutional amendment to balance the budget. I do believe it is good policy for America to pass a balanced budget plan now and to implement it. On the partial birth abortion issue, I would very much--I wanted to sign that legislation. When I first heard about it, I thought I would sign it, since I am generally opposed to third trimester abortions anyway and signed legislation to restrict them in Arkansas. The problem is I will say again there are a few hundred women every year who have personally agonizing situations where their children are born or are about to be born with terrible deformities which will cause them to die either just before, during, or just after childbirth. And these women, among other things, cannot preserve the ability to have further children unless the enormous size of the baby's head is reduced before being extracted from their bodies. This is a very painful thing to discuss. I have met six of these women. I will say again--three of them were pro-life Catholics. One of them was a pro-life Evangelical Christian. This is "not" a pro-life/pro-choice issue. To me, this is a practical problem. I believe that people put in that situation ought not to have Congress tell them that they're never going to be able to have children again. Now, I know there are just a few hundred of them, and I know that all the votes were on the other side. And I am well aware that there are several places in this country where major political headway was made against the Vice President and me and against some of our candidates for Congress and against others running for other things because of this issue, because it sounds so awful when you describe it that the politics is all on the other side. But one of the things the President is supposed to do is to look out for the few hundred against the many millions when the facts are not consistent with the rhetoric. And I'm just telling you, you know, Hillary and I only--we only had one child. And I just cannot look at a woman who's in a situation where the baby she is bearing against all her wishes and prayers is going to die anyway and tell her that I am signing a law which will prevent her from ever having another child. I'm not going to do it. FOCUS - POLITICAL WRAP

JIM LEHRER: Now some analysis of today's choices and other recent matters by Shields & Gigot, syndicated columnist Mark Shields, "Wall Street Journal" columnist Paul Gigot. And by choices, we mean to the President's team. Is there an overall phrase that fits what he's done so far, do you think, Paul?

PAUL GIGOT, Wall Street Journal: The world that comes to my mind is continuity. A lot of the choices are staying put, some of the bigger choices. Robert Rubin at the Treasury, Janet Reno as attorney general, those are two big positions that are staying put. Some of the other people are moving around a little bit. I don't see a dramatic shift. The other thing I'd say--and I've been talking--asking some Republicans about this, and they seem to agree--is the President is off to a better start this time in terms of personnel than he was four years ago. He's not--

JIM LEHRER: In what way?

PAUL GIGOT: He's not getting tangled up as much, at least not in public, with the diversity problem, for example, having had one from column A and one from column B, and this special interest group. There's been a little bit of that, but much less obviously. And he's handling it better. He seems to be balancing some of the ethics difficulties, at least at this stage, better. He's not on his third attorney general nominee, for example. So I think so far he's actually doing pretty well.

JIM LEHRER: Overview?

MARK SHIELDS, Syndicated Columnist: Overview. Certainly today's appointments were revealing, I thought, especially, first of all, Gene Sperling, who doesn't get mentioned, the National Economic Council. I think Paul and I would probably both agree if there was a deserving promotion and appointment, and there's nobody who's worked harder, longer, and probably more effectively for Bill Clinton than Gene Sperling.

JIM LEHRER: The President said that he was going to introduce a whole new concept to Sperling, which was "sleep," you know. He types around the clock and all of that.

MARK SHIELDS: But in both Bill Daley and Bill Richardson, he chose national Democrats who were not Clinton people. In other words, they didn't come to national prominence just in Bill Clinton's candidacy or his career. Bill Daley of Chicago, the brother of the mayor, the son of the late mayor, a formidable political presence in himself, was passed over, and Paul mentioned the diversity criteria in 1993. He was going to be the secretary of transportation. And he got passed over, Jim, because he didn't meet the diversity criteria. And the President wanted the presence of Denver--former Denver Mayor Federico Pena as secretary of transportation. At that point, a verb grew up. The verb was to be Daleyed. To be Daleyed was to be passed over for an appointment, a presidential appointment, when you didn't meet the diversity criteria they were seeking. And he didn't sulk.

JIM LEHRER: --why he didn't sulk--non-political people would say, you know, enough of these people. They did this to me once--

PAUL GIGOT: If you're Richard Daley, you don't sulk.

MARK SHIELDS: You don't get mad; you get even. But, you know, at some point, you say, you know, sure they wanted Chicago to have the convention, and that was important.

JIM LEHRER: Daley was very much involved in that--both Daleys. But Bill Daley was--

MARK SHIELDS: Absolutely. General chair and all the rest of it, and he was the dominant presence. But David Gergen, then the presidential counselor, and then a very, very strong advocate and champion of NAFTA within the White House, where there was division in the White House, said publicly that the only reason the NAFTA pact passed the Congress was because of Bill Daley. Bill Daley came in, summoned in as the relief pitcher at a critical moment, organized, pushed, implemented, went to the Hill, himself, to counter strategy.

JIM LEHRER: Well, how would you define what his job was? It was kind of an off-government position to push NAFTA, right?

MARK SHIELDS: That's right.

JIM LEHRER: A public lobby in a way.

MARK SHIELDS: He was. He was almost a one-man war room is what it turns out to be. So I think that--and Bill Richardson, again, nine terms in the House. Both of them are politicians, and I--I have a bias in favor of politicians.

JIM LEHRER: Well, Richardson--we'll talk about Richardson in a minute, but, first, on Daley, Paul, President Clinton--other presidents have appointed big business types to this Commerce job. Ron Brown is not a big business type, Mickey Kantor was not, and now Bill Daley is not.

PAUL GIGOT: Well, in this instance, I think that's absolutely right. Republicans have tended to put big business people in that job, or business people, businessmen and women. The--Frank--

JIM LEHRER: No, Brady's the other job--sorry.

PAUL GIGOT: And the President very pointedly picked two politicians in the first term, Ron Brown and Mickey Kantor, to succeed him. And I think in that sense Bill Daley is probably doing the President a second favor. The first is NAFTA. The second has taken its job, because Commerce is probably, in my mind, the least desirable job in this administration, because what happened in the campaign. I mean, it's pretty clear--

JIM LEHRER: The Huang Indonesian connection, et cetera.

PAUL GIGOT: The Commerce Department was used as a way to raise money for the Democratic Party. There's no question about it. John Huang had his headquarters, if you will, set right up there. And Ron Brown was a very effective political advocate using business levers and so on to get business support. So I think it's going to be scrutinized by the Republicans. That whole thing is going to be scrutinized. And there's a lot of Republicans who still think if there's one cabinet department we can get rid of, it's this one.

JIM LEHRER: And they probably won't now that--they'll have trouble now that Bill Daley has got the job, you mean?

PAUL GIGOT: It'll be more difficult.

JIM LEHRER: More difficult.

MARK SHIELDS: But Bill Daley, I mean, had been mentioned, most of the speculation had focused on transportation. Transportation's a great job. You've got the Coast Guard, planes, and trains, and buses, and trucks. And Paul is right, Jim. He's going to be playing defense over at Commerce. I mean, even though it didn't happen on his watch, it's going to take the time, effort, and energy of his people to answer all those inquiries, to testify on the Hill, and to fight the rear guard action against those who say doesn't this prove that it was just a place to load up the airplanes with businessmen for trips abroad, at special appointment, and they then, in turn, supported the party.

JIM LEHRER: Let's talk about Richardson. He was on this program the other night talking about his Sudan thing. And he had been here before two or three times talking about the other rescue missions. And he said today, I'm a public official and a politician, and I'm proud of it. People don't say that very often.

MARK SHIELDS: No. And Bill Richardson, Bill Richards on is. I mean, nine terms in the House--

JIM LEHRER: From New Mexico.

MARK SHIELDS: From New Mexico. Hispanic. The President mentioned that in introducing him today.

JIM LEHRER: Hispanic mother, Anglo father.

MARK SHIELDS: That's right. But the President mentioned that he was proud of his Spanish tradition but, again, NAFTA is central. There was probably the biggest domestic triumph of Bill Clinton's first two years with the passage of NAFTA and alone in the Democratic House leadership, as chief deputy whip, one of the fourth chief deputy whips; he was the only one supporting NAFTA, Bill Richardson was. He was up--above board about it. Dick Gephardt, Dave Bonior, and the others were on the other side. But he was very, very effective and formidable, and then he became, as he talked in that interview with Margaret the other night, this remarkable sort of extra legal--the best sense of it--or, you know, ambassador without portfolio but with a real mandate. I mean, his achievements are singular.

JIM LEHRER: How do you think that's going to translate into being the United States Ambassador to the United Nations, Paul?

PAUL GIGOT: My only concern for him would be whether or not he thinks this is a demotion because he's already been, more or less, acting secretary of state. I think he's closed more deals than Warren Christopher did, just. I mean, I think it's a job he's going to like. It's a job he's going to like because he's been moving around the world. He knows these people, and I think he's going to find that dealing with diplomacy is something that suits his temperament, and I think he's going to be pretty good--he could do this job very effectively.

JIM LEHRER: Yeah. He was quoted today, or people were talking about him today in all the profiles that the wires moved and all of that about how when he sits down with one of these folks to negotiate, he doesn't leave until he's got what he came for. And he has just ways of just saying in there, hanging in there, hanging in there.

PAUL GIGOT: They should send him to see President Assad, you know, for one of those legendary 24-hour--

MARK SHIELDS: They tried to get him out of North Korea. Remember that? He wouldn't go until he left with the assurance the pilot was going to follow him with the remains of the American airman who had been killed there.

JIM LEHRER: Well, the same way with Sudan. He sat under this tree with this guy for four hours. You know, the guy harangued about the United States, and he finally found this deal, et cetera. Okay now, Janet Reno stays as attorney general. Big deal, big surprise?

PAUL GIGOT: I don't think it's a big surprise. I don't think the President had much choice. I think with all of the problems that he is going to have to face on the ethics front. I think, but having somebody with a reputation for independence, having appointment four special counsels, even though she turned down the last one on campaign finance, I think if she wanted it, and she made a public display of saying she did--

JIM LEHRER: She wanted that job.

PAUL GIGOT: --she was going to get it. I don't think the President had much choice there.

JIM LEHRER: And so her reputation for being a non-team player kind of works to the President's advantage, does it not, in terms of credibility?

MARK SHIELDS: This is another politician. This is somebody who's run for and won office in her own right, and I thought she was--

JIM LEHRER: She was prosecuting attorney at Dade County.

MARK SHIELDS: She was prosecuting attorney at Dade County. And she was adroit in hanging onto that job. I mean, there was no way in the world they were going to get her out of there with blasting powder, and I mean, she put them in a position, the White House in a position politically, they couldn't move on her.

JIM LEHRER: I love what she said. She said, do you intend to stay? She said, ask the President.

MARK SHIELDS: That's right.

JIM LEHRER: Most cabinet officers say, oh, well--and, of course, Robert Rubin, secretary of the treasury, he's a real star of this administration up till now, and there was never any question of his leaving, was there?

PAUL GIGOT: No. If the President wants him there, I think there's no question. In the first, remember, he was the head of the National Economic Council, this operation in the White House. No disrespect to Gene Sperling, who I agree with, who's now getting that job.

JIM LEHRER: Replacing Laura Tyson.

PAUL GIGOT: Replacing Laura Tyson.

JIM LEHRER: Going back to teaching in California.

PAUL GIGOT: Who works as hard as Mark says but he--but this is, I think there's no question that the real heart of the President's economic team has moved over to treasury. I mean, he is the big dog in this game, and the President relies on him a lot more than he does on some of the others.

MARK SHIELDS: Everybody who deals with Bob Rubin, whether with him or against him, on any particular controversial issue, says invariably the same thing, he's a grown-up. He's got his ego totally under control, in check, and he's a real grown-up dealing with--

JIM LEHRER: The President made a speech earlier this week to the Democratic Leadership Council, which is the moderate centrist Democratic organization, that he said he wants to govern the second term in the strong center. What--does his team reflect that?

MARK SHIELDS: I think his team does reflect it.

JIM LEHRER: Did I say that right? That's what he said. Strong center.

MARK SHIELDS: Yes, that's right. Vital.

PAUL GIGOT: Vital.

JIM LEHRER: I knew I didn't say it quite right.

MARK SHIELDS: Vital signs--

JIM LEHRER: Got you.

MARK SHIELDS: Jim, I think the team does reflect it. It is not an ideological team, but I have to say, you know, the center is a derivative place. I mean, you take the center, you have to say where's the left, where's the right, and I'm going to get--and it shifts constantly. I mean, if you want to look at it, two years ago in this town, the balanced budget amendment was conservative dogma. Now it's the center. Three years ago in this town the family and medical leave idea was a liberal, looney plan. Now I didn't hear anybody in 1996 running on let's repeal the family and medical leave. The same thing with minimum wage.

JIM LEHRER: Raising the minimum wage.

MARK SHIELDS: Raising the minimum wage. And that became consensus, so the problem is with saying I'm a centrist is you're leaving your definition in a derivative, almost remainder--to those on either side.

PAUL GIGOT: Mark is describing the difficulty of governing from the center, but I--and I agree with the problems, and the President could get caught in-between, caught in the cross-fire, but I don't think--I think that the vital center is just a political rhetoric which does really not do justice to what he is trying to do, which I think is to revitalize the Democratic Party, redefine the Democratic Party, in an area when voters seem to have put a lid on government. They put--the taxpayers are saying we're not going to give government any more money, we're not going to allow you to grow, and Bill Clinton has to take that tax-and-spend label which has been so debilitating for Democrats for so long and get rid of it. And that's what the balanced budget pledge does. That's the threshold issue.

JIM LEHRER: At the same time, not going to far the other way, which was the Gingrich revolution so the two together leaves him in the center, is that what you're saying?

PAUL GIGOT: He's carving out, trying to carve out that area.

MARK SHIELDS: Gingrich gave him the center. I mean, Gingrich gave him the center after 13 months. The center has been very good to Bill Clinton politically, all right? I mean, for 13 months because he was unchallenged for the Democratic nomination in 1996, he could run for the center while the Republicans were dancing over on the right.

JIM LEHRER: We have to run for the weekend. Thank you both very much.

JIM LEHRER: Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, an affirmative action update from California and some new word on humankind. UPDATE - PROPOSITION 209

JIM LEHRER: Now an update on California's Proposition 209, the constitutional amendment that would end the state's affirmative action programs. It was approved in last fall's election, but the fight about it continues. Jeffrey Kaye of KCET-Los Angeles reports.

JEFFREY KAYE: Since the election, supporters of affirmative action have been fighting to block implementation of Proposition 209. They have protested in the streets and in the courts.

SPOKESMAN: We are confident that Proposition 209 will not see the light of day. We are--

JEFFREY KAYE: And they succeeded, at least temporarily. A statewide coalition of civil rights and labor groups filed suit, and two weeks ago, San Francisco Federal Judge Thelton Henderson granted their request for a temporary restraining order. On Monday, the same judge is to hold a hearing on whether to extend his order and stop the proposition from taking effect until the courts decide its fate.

MARK ROSENBAUM, American Civil Liberties Union: We wanted to hone down the legal theory, and we submitted over 70 affidavits and declarations to the court.

JEFFREY KAYE: A team of lawyers, including Mark Rosenbaum, of the American Civil Liberties Union, began laying the groundwork for a constitutional challenge months before the election.

MARK ROSENBAUM: Proposition 209 represents the most far ranging attack on civil rights legislation and the most absolute disabling of government from dealing with racial and gender discrimination in the history of the United States.

JEFFREY KAYE: But lawyer Manny Klausner, who represents the initiative's proponents, disagrees.

MANNY KLAUSNER, Proponent, Proposition 209: Our view is that the constitutionality of Prop 209 is so clear that ultimately we will prevail.

JEFFREY KAYE: Klausner helped draft Prop 209 and was vice-chair of the campaign.

MANNY KLAUSNER: When Thurgood Marshall argued in Brown Vs. Board of Education against government racially segregated public schools, he didn't say we want racial preferences. He said we want a colorblind system.

JEFFREY KAYE: As they did during the campaign, each side says its case is supported by law and by the U.S. Constitution. Opponents contend that the abolition of affirmative action would violate the 14th amendment's guarantee of equal protection.

MARK ROSENBAUM: Under Proposition 209, state and local government for the first time in the history of the United States is going to be disabled from passing into law constitutionally permissive programs that specifically address discrimination. The Fire Department or Police Department has a history of discrimination against women, against blacks, against Latinos, against Asians. What Proposition 209 says is your hands are tied, you can do nothing to eliminate discrimination, while at the same time, what Proposition 209 does is move whites up to the front of the line. If you want to go to government because you want your kid to get a preference from a university because you've given a lot of money, or because you're an alumni, that's all fine and acceptable under 209, but one thing the government can't do is redress discrimination. And that has profound consequences for California and for the entire country.

MANNY KLAUSNER: The concept of the government making classifications based on race is morally odious. The courts have long recognized this to be the case. They're very different than other types of preferences, and so if preference is given to somebody based on their athletic prowess or their musical ability or where they happen to live, or whether they're disadvantaged economically, or a slew of other types of preferences, those are of a different order. The state in a free society should never be allowed to be--should never be granted the authority to look at somebody's skin color and say you're in and you're out.

JEFFREY KAYE: The writers of the initiative did not use the term "affirmative action." Businessman Ward Connerly chaired the campaign which he said was about ending preferences.

WARD CONNERLY, Proponent, Proposition 209: The initiative says the state shall not discriminate against or grant preferential treatment to any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting. Thirty-seven words that are simple, that are direct, are clear.

JEFFREY KAYE: Connerly, a regent at the University ofCalifornia, was also a major force in last year's decision to phase out affirmative action in the university's nine-campus system. After Prop 209 passed last month, the university decided to move up its schedule to end affirmative action. In fact, UCLA had prepared letters accepting 500 students for the spring quarter without taking race and gender into account. Under affirmative action admission policies, most new students met the minimum criteria, but some who were less qualified got in over higher performance. The few exceptions to the minimum standards were mostly athletes. If the judge continues to block Prop 209, UCLA will add slots and use affirmative action criteria to admit additional students for next quarter according to Assistant Vice Chancellor Thomas Lifka.

THOMAS LIFKA, UCLA: Several more dozen students, you know, at most, yes, a relatively small number.

JEFFREY KAYE: Using affirmative action.

THOMAS LIFKA: Using affirmative action.

JEFFREY KAYE: Meaning what?

THOMAS LIFKA: Meaning that race and ethnicity will be taken into account as one factor among many factors, supplemental factors, along with the academic record which, of course, remains the most important thing we look at it, in making a decision as to whether or not to admit that student to UCLA.

JEFFREY KAYE: Because the judge put Prop 209 on "hold," California's affirmative action programs remain in place. That leaves in tact programs such as those in Pasadena which plaintiffs named in the lawsuit in an effort to ensure the status quo. Pasadena has a multi-ethnic population, 18 percent black, 27 percent Latino, 8 percent Asian, 5 percent Armenian. The variety is reflected in such celebrations as Cultural Diversity Month. The city's mayor is William Paparian.

WILLIAM PAPARIAN, Mayor, Pasadena: We're not perfect, but we think we've done a darn good job of developing a work force that mirrors the population that we serve.

JEFFREY KAYE: That's the goal?

WILLIAM PAPARIAN: That's the goal, and we've hit it in several instances.

JEFFREY KAYE: And does that mean giving preferences to certain minorities and women to achieve that goal? WILLIAM PAPARIAN: Absolutely not. It's legal to do that under current federal law.

JEFFREY KAYE: If you don't give preferences, how do you meet the goal?

WILLIAM PAPARIAN: We let people know that there's opportunities to come and compete. We found that when minorities and women know about opportunities, they come in and compete.

JEFFREY KAYE: The city conducts affirmative action by advertising jobs in under-represented ethnic communities. Officials worry that under Proposition 209, such outreach programs could be considered preferential treatment. At the city's affirmative action office, Lance Charles, the department head, monitors hiring.

LANCE CHARLES, Affirmative Action Office, Pasadena: What we do, we just take the number of openings that each department is going to have.

JEFFREY KAYE: Right.

LANCE CHARLES: And we put them--we just list those as goals, hiring goals. Not that these are firm, fixed goals--these are just hiring opportunities.

JEFFREY KAYE: And do the departments have to meet those goals?

LANCE CHARLES: We would like for them to, and, in fact, but if it don't--there is actually no penalty if they don't reach them.

JEFFREY KAYE: And you want them to take race and sex into account when they make the hire.

LANCE CHARLES: Well, we want--you know, there's no way you're going to ever get around the issue of race and sex. You're never going to get around that because that's what we are. Sothe thing is you have to also--you have to look at it. Now take my department, for instance. When I came here, there was no female professionals. Men. Now, we know we deal with a lot of issues with females. We know it's good business to have a female professional because we've got 35 percent females in the city. So naturally, when I got an opportunity to hire, I hired two females because I needed to have a diverse group. I have two males and four females in my department.

JEFFREY KAYE: Were you giving preferences in that case?

LANCE CHARLES: No.

JEFFREY KAYE: To the women?

LANCE CHARLES: No. We didn't give them any preference. That's what came out of the pool. If two males would have come through the system fully qualified and they would have been the best in that pool, I would have taken them.

JEFFREY KAYE: Pasadena officials say they have achieved a diverse work force without preferences or quotas and hope their program of targeted outreach will survive even if Proposition 209 eventually takes effect. All sides are forecasting a protracted legal battle as the issue wends its way through the court system. FINALLY - FAMILY TREE

JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight, more discoveries about early humankind and to Charlayne Hunter-Gault.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Modern humans may have had more company than we thought--a third human species alive and well and living in Asia for tens of thousands of years. That's the startling and controversial new research finding reported in a study out today in the journal "Science." A team of scientists contends that the species, homo erectus, believed to be an ancestor of modern humans, existed as recently as 27,000 years ago, long after scientists believed it extinct. That would mean homo erectus lived alongside modern humans, homo sapiens, for thousands of years. The third species, the Neanderthal, was also alive at the same time. For some insight into these findings and what they could mean for the tree of life, we're joined by Richard Potts, director of the Human Origins project at the Smithsonian Institution. And welcome back, Dr. Potts. We just spoke to you earlier this week about Mary Leakey. Now on this, first, briefly tell us what the conventional wisdom is that we had our origins and how this changes it.

RICHARD POTTS, Smithsonian Institution: Sure. We used to think that our family tree, the human family tree, was pretty simple. You could draw it as a trunk, a tree with a trunk, simple trunk through time which led from, as we see in the fossils, replicas that we have here.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: These in front of you here.

RICHARD POTTS: Yeah. We have exact replicas of some of the fossils that are being discussed in today's news, and we can see in the simple view that there is a transition from homo erectus, that lived starting back in Africa about 1.8 million years ago, but then lived for a very long time, was a very successful species, but then were was a transition to more modern-looking forms and, ultimately, to modern homo sapiens, people who look like us, and of course, we are one species all today, just a single species living today.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: And the difference between these and these--these don't have faces, but in--when they existed, what was the difference between these two and these two?

RICHARD POTTS: Right. Well, as you can see from these, that you have a--basically a very heavy brow ridge. The face would have been down like here. And a very heavy brow ridge, and you could notice that the brain case arcs at a very low angle. It had a cranial capacity that was significantly less than that of modern human beings. We have here a Neanderthal, for example, as an example, and here we see again a much larger brain case than in homo erectus, and we have still, though, a heavy brow ridge. The brain case still arcs at this low angle, then as an example of modern human being, we have a repackaged brain case. It looks more of a globe or a sphere with relatively little brow ridge. And so the news today of this particular form, homo erectus, living at the same time as this particular form, well, there are no anthropologists, or at least very few anthropologists who would claim that these are the same species. There has been a long series of debate about the Neanderthals and modern humans that whether they might have inter- bred, whether they represented one species or separate species, but the homo erectus, living at perhaps anywhere from twenty-seven thousand years ago to fifty-three thousand years ago, that's what the new report says, that's astonishing. It means that there are at least two, possibly three, different species of humans walking around at the same time.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: And what does that mean?

RICHARD POTTS: Well, that means that our family tree is no longer a trunk. It means that it's a bush. We used to think that it was always a trunk, but starting about ten years ago, we began to realize that the early part of human evolution was, in fact, a bush with many side branches, that there were many different what we might think of as experiments in being human, as I often call it. We know that that bushiness of our family tree lasted up until very recent times.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: But once we know that, what do we know?

RICHARD POTTS: Well, it's a good question, because it brings up perhaps "the" most important. Today's report deals with what I think of as the "what" and "when" questions of our origins. What species is it and when did it exist? There are other questions that the new report suggests that we would ask, and that's the how and why. Why were there different species? Why did the human experiment, the evolutionary experiment, lead to several different species, and why was ours the one that persisted, while others died out?

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Was it in the past, that maybe those earlier forms died out through wars or fighting or something like that?

RICHARD POTTS: Well, it could be that on the island of Java, which is where the new dates have been obtained, and these particular replicas of the fossils come from the Island of Java, and that may have been a refuge where the life ways of homo erectus could have survived for longer than it did in other parts of the world. If it was a refuge, well, then it brings up the point that modern homo sapiens, which has persisted, of course, to the present may have been adapted to the much wider ranges of environmental changes. We have evidence for dramatic environmental change over the last million years. It's during that time that modern homo sapiens evolved, and, clearly, we are certainly and adaptable hominid or early human.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Well, did the brain capacity have anything to do with the survival?

RICHARD POTTS: It could have. It could have. Brain capacity. We carry sort of our own laptop computers on top of our skulls, tremendous computing capacity, able to take in a lot of environmental information, respond to it, and it seems, based on what we know from the behavior of homo erectus, that they lived what we might think of as a rather monotonous lifestyle, making stone hand axes for hundreds of years in pretty much the same way.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Is there anything in these new findings to suggest that these two got together, I mean, co-habited, or played cards together, or whatever--whatever they did?

RICHARD POTTS: They certainly showed that homo erectus and modern humans, if, in fact, the dating is correct, they show that the two species were around at the same time on earth. But there is no evidence that I'm familiar with at least that modern homo sapiens and these particular skulls of homo erectus from the Solo River of Java were there at the same time.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: But there's controversy in at least two associated with these findings.

RICHARD POTTS: Yeah.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Very briefly, tell me about those.

RICHARD POTTS: Well, there's the out-of-Africa idea, which is to suggest that your transition from homo erectus to homo sapiens occurred in a small series of populations, or maybe in a single population based in Africa. Those modern homo sapiens then spread out across the world and replaced archaic-looking hominids such as homo erectus in other places. The continuity model is the other model. And that suggests that this transition from one species to another took place over a broad area--Asia, Africa, and Europe.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Not just Africa.

RICHARD POTTS: Exactly.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: And the second controversy has to do with the findings, themselves, and how they were done, right?

RICHARD POTTS: Indeed, indeed. There's always, in science, we live in a community of doubters, as I call it. We're all skeptics. And this is wonderful news. The lab at Berkeley that did this work is very, very good, but there are always going to be doubts and questions about how and where they got the dating. And this will have to be--involve many other labs, and perhaps trips to Java to find more fossils.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Because they didn't find--it wasn't the fossils that they found, new fossils that they discovered. It was just a new technique.

RICHARD POTTS: Exactly. They didn't date the human fossils, themselves. They dated an antelope's tooth that was associated with the fossils, and in a river setting, it could be that fossils of different ages were mixed together.

CHARLAYNE HUNTER-GAULT: Okay. So lots of questions. Well, that's what we're here for, so maybe one day we'll do it again. Thank you for coming.

RICHARD POTTS: Thanks very much. RECAP

JIM LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Friday, President Clinton announced more appointments for his second term, including Bill Daley of Chicago as secretary of commerce, and Congressman Bill Richardson to be U.N. ambassador. He also said he had asked Attorney General Janet Reno, Treasury Sec. Robert Rubin, HHS Sec. Donna Shalala, EPA Administrator Carol Browner, and Trade Rep. Sharlene Barshefsky to stay on. At the United Nations, Kofi Annan of Ghana was selected to replace Boutros Boutros-Ghali as U.N. Secretary-General. We'll see you online and again here Monday evening. Have a nice weekend. I'm Jim Lehrer. Thank you and good night.