Panel Likely to Condemn Cranston Acts : Ethics: Senator said to escape trial or censure for his actions in the ‘Keating Five’ affair but faces rebuke in full debate on the floor today.

WASHINGTON —  The Senate Ethics Committee, ending an agonizing investigation that began more than two years ago, agreed Tuesday to strongly condemn the actions of Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) on behalf of Lincoln Savings & Loan owner Charles H. Keating Jr., sources said.

While the panel stopped short of recommending a full Senate trial or formal censure for Cranston, the senator will not avoid a full Senate debate of his conduct in the Keating affair.

It is not known whether the Senate will be asked to vote on the Cranston case. Majority Leader George J. Mitchell (D-Me.) announced Tuesday night that all senators will be expected to sit at their desks in the chamber to hear the Ethics Committee report.

Mitchell said that all senators will be summoned to the Senate floor at 2 p.m. today to hear and then debate the report. The debate is scheduled to last two hours and 15 minutes.

Cranston announced Tuesday night that he will speak on the Senate floor. He said that he will be accompanied by his lawyer, criminal appeals attorney Alan M. Dershowitz. But under Senate rules, Dershowitz is not entitled to speak.

It was not immediately apparent exactly how harshly the committee report would criticize Cranston’s actions. One knowledgeable committee source described the report as “severe action” and added that the panel had chosen “good, strong words” to condemn Cranston.

In a previous report, the committee said that Cranston may have violated Senate ethical standards by creating an “appearance of impropriety” in his dealings with Keating.

In his defense, Cranston is expected to argue that there is no Senate rule that specifically prohibits a senator from accepting contributions from a constituent and contacting federal officials on that constituent’s behalf. He will also repeat his assertion that the appearance of impropriety is not the same as actual impropriety.

No matter how strongly the Senate committee’s statement is worded, the committee’s action would appear to represent a partial victory for Cranston in his lengthy battle against allegations that he violated the Senate’s ethical standards by soliciting contributions from Keating and then intervened with federal regulators on behalf of Lincoln Savings.

Cranston, 77, who insists that he has done nothing wrong, has spent the last nine months quietly lobbying behind the scenes to avoid a Senate trial or censure by the Senate. And as a result, Democrats on the Ethics Committee strongly resisted efforts by Republicans to censure him.

By issuing a final judgment in the Cranston case, the committee will bring to a close one of the most embarrassing and longest-running investigations it has ever conducted. Cranston, in his defense, has sought to escape condemnation by turning the spotlight on other senators--arguing that his actions were similar to those of all other senators.

It was more than two years ago that the six-member Ethics Committee, acting on a complaint filed by Common Cause, the self-described citizens’ lobby, began looking into allegations that Cranston and four other senators acted improperly when they solicited large contributions from Keating, then contacted investigators at the Federal Home Loan Bank Board on his behalf.

Last February, after several months of public hearings, the panel dropped its investigation of the other four senators--John Glenn (D-Ohio), John McCain (R-Ariz.), Dennis DeConcini (D-Ariz.) and Donald W. Riegle Jr. (D-Mich.). Glenn and McCain were mildly chastised for their behavior; DeConcini and Riegle received somewhat stronger rebukes.

At the same time, the panel announced that it had found “substantial credible evidence” of misconduct by Cranston and would continue to investigate him. Shortly thereafter, a stalemate developed within the six-member committee; the three Republican members demanded censure and the three Democrats refused to agree.

About a month ago, it appeared that the stalement would force the committee simply to drop the investigation. But after confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas cast embarrassment on the Senate, committee members renewed their efforts to find a compromise. The report approved Tuesday is the result of those negotiations.

Cranston has admitted soliciting nearly $1 million in donations from Keating for his 1984 presidential campaign, his 1986 senatorial campaign, the California Democratic Party and a variety of voter registration groups founded by the California senator. In addition, he acknowledges that on a few occasions he solicited funds from Keating at the same time that the Lincoln Savings owner persuaded him to intervene with federal regulators.

But the senator strongly insists that there was no connection between the contributions and Cranston’s willingness to contact Federal Home Loan Bank Board officials, who were investigating allegations of mismanagement and fraud at Lincoln.

Although the bank board delayed action against Lincoln for more than two years, officials of the agency have testified that the delay had nothing to do with the pressure brought by Cranston and others. By the time Lincoln finally was seized by the government in April, 1989, it had piled up about $2 billion of federally insured losses.

The Ethics Committee’s recommendation for a full Senate debate was a novel conclusion to an investigation by the panel. Under most circumstances, the committee either issues a report reprimanding a senator under investigation or it asks the full Senate to censure or expel that senator.

But in this case, the committee has chosen a compromise solution somewhere between committee action and full Senate action.

The debate comes at a particularly difficult time for Cranston, who has been suffering severely from the lingering effects of radiation treatments that he received late last year for prostate cancer. Just last week, Cranston underwent tests at Stanford University Hospital to determine the causes of his continuing discomfort.