Packwood Hearings Put Pressure on Panel : Ethics: Female lawmakers, advocacy groups push Senate committee to open up its investigation. Decision on next step is delayed again.

WASHINGTON â€”  The Senate Ethics Committee came under intense pressure Wednesday to open its hearings on allegations of sexual misconduct against Sen. Bob Packwood (R-Ore.), chairman of the Finance Committee.

Six of the Senate’s eight female senators joined a growing number of advocacy groups in pressing the committee to permit the complaints to be made in public--something Republican leaders are clearly loath to do.

“This is not a light or frivolous matter. This does not involve sexual misconduct just once or twice or three times . . . but 17 times,� said Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), who has drafted legislation ordering the committee to open its hearings if it fails to do so on its own.

“This is a Republican Senate and, if the Republicans vote to close the doors on this . . . the public will never forget it,� Boxer warned, adding that the reaction from women’s groups to any effort to keep the allegations from becoming public would “make the Anita Hill case look like a birthday party.�

The six-member committee deliberated for more than two hours Wednesday but failed for the second day in a row to reach agreement on its next step in a process that began more than two years ago when it began investigating allegations that Packwood had made unwanted sexual advances toward women on numerous occasions between 1969 and 1990. Members of the panel expect to meet again before the end of the week but did not say when.

In another high-profile ethics case now before Congress, the House Ethics Committee announced that it will summon House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) and media magnate Rupert Murdoch to testify this month about the Speaker’s controversial book deal and other allegations of ethical improprieties pending against him.

In the Gingrich case, a number of other witnesses also will be called before the end of the month to testify about the details of Gingrich’s book contract with HarperCollins, a New York publishing firm owned by Murdoch, according to Rep. Jim McDermott of Washington, the committee’s ranking Democrat.

In formal complaints to the House committee, Democrats have charged that the potentially lucrative book deal raises ethical questions because of other business interests that Murdoch has pending before Congress.

The committee also voted not to take action against Rep. Robert G. Torricelli (D-N.J.) for disclosing classified information about CIA activities in Guatemala.

Torricelli had come under fire in March for making public information that linked a Guatemalan army officer on the CIA’s payroll to the 1990 murder of a U.S. citizen and to the 1992 torture-killing of a Guatemalan rebel married to an American. His action spawned investigations both in Congress and the executive branch into CIA and Army intelligence activities in Guatemala. It also raised new questions about whether U.S. efforts to promote human rights in Central America were being undermined by intelligence activities.

At the same time, however, the move prompted charges that Torricelli had violated an oath not to reveal classified information.

While the ethics panel did not completely endorse Torricelli’s actions, it found that the oath required of Intelligence Committee members was too ambiguous to be used as a basis to punish him.

Although the Packwood case had faded from public attention as the Senate ethics panel moved its inquiry behind closed doors, it resurfaced last May when the committee announced that it had found “substantial credible evidence� to support charges of both sexual and official misconduct.

The committee’s three Republicans and three Democrats also accused Packwood of improperly soliciting job offers for his ex-wife from lobbyists and of altering private diaries that the panel had subpoenaed as evidence.

The allegations of sexual misconduct have proved to be the most embarrassing for a nearly all-male Senate that has yet to recover from its handling of law professor Anita Faye Hill’s allegations of sexual harassment against Clarence Thomas during his confirmation hearings as a justice of the Supreme Court.

Packwood testified privately before the committee last month, and the case has now reached a point where the lawmakers must either decide to conduct public hearings on the charges or reach its verdict behind closed doors, along with a recommendation for punishment by the Senate if it finds Packwood guilty. Punishment could range anywhere from a simple reprimand to expulsion.