LEAVE WELFARE REFORMS ALONE

Meanwhile, congressional Republicans are in a somewhat better position to keep recent welfare reforms intact, despite pressure from Democrats to undo the changes.

When he signed the Republican-engineered welfare overhaul bill last August, he promised to come back and changes the parts he considered too severe: food stamps cuts and benefits for legal immigrants.

Democrats made it clear before the election that if they retook control of Congress and kept President Clinton in the White House, there would be yet another massive welfare restructuring that would essentially return the costly bureaucracy and additional funding to Washington.

With such GOP determination to let the 1996 welfare reforms sink in, Hillary Rodham Clinton should forgo any aspirations of becoming the nation's welfare czar. It is up to the states to deal with welfare now. Let them deal with it with any more interference from Pennsylvania Avenue.