Free-Trade Issue Confronts 3 Democrats in Michigan : Politics: Clinton and Tsongas are challenged on their support for quick negotiations on proposed pact with Mexico. Brown has an easier time.

FLINT, Mich. —  If there is an epicenter to protectionist sentiment in the United States, it might be this battered industrial town, where the loss of automobile jobs has become a dreary ritual.

That harsh reality made for plenty of shock waves Saturday when the three Democratic presidential contenders arrived here to talk about jobs and trade.

Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton and former Massachusetts Sen. Paul E. Tsongas had the toughest assignment: defending their support for open trade, as well as quick negotiations for a free-trade agreement with Mexico.

Former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr. faced no such problems. His visit to Flint provided him with another opportunity to stress his opposition to the Mexico negotiations.

After receiving relatively little attention through the first primaries, concerns about trade--particularly the proposed agreement with Mexico--have emerged as a major issue in Michigan, which holds its primary Tuesday.

For both Clinton and Tsongas, Michigan represents a kind of gantlet. Both have resisted sweeping protectionist measures, such as quotas on Japanese automobiles. But their commitment is being tested in a state where prevailing sentiment was crisply summarized by a sign held aloft at a Clinton rally Saturday: “Support America. Tell Japan to go to hell.”

Many Michigan residents also fear the Mexico free-trade accord would accelerate the relocation of automobile manufacturing plants south of the border, a bleak prospect in a state that already has lost as many as 150,000 automobile-related jobs since 1979.

Although Clinton’s views on trade have been sharply criticized by local labor leaders, it does not appear to have hurt him too much with most voters. A Mason-Dixon poll released Friday showed Clinton leading Tsongas 48% to 22% in Michigan, with Brown trailing at 11%.

But many local observers believe that Brown is gaining ground by taking a tough pro-labor stand on trade questions. In his television advertisements, Brown is hammering both Tsongas and Clinton for their support of expedited “fast-track” negotiations with Mexico, a position he reiterated at a rally Saturday in Flint.

Brown said that thwarting the agreement is “a question of survival” for communities like Flint.

One sign of Brown’s new standing in the state came when he received an endorsement Saturday from filmmaker Michael Moore, whose quirky documentary “Roger and Me” chronicled Flint’s relentless loss of General Motors jobs.

Saturday night, Brown was endorsed by longtime Detroit-area Rep. John Conyers Jr. “In the Democratic race, there’s one person that stands out, and that’s Jerry Brown,” Conyers said.

Tsongas, meanwhile, seems resigned to disappointing finishes in Michigan and Illinois, which also holds a primary Tuesday. He told reporters Saturday, “I’m not going to talk about expectations. What we have to do is establish a competitiveness in Michigan and Illinois. The standard for us is competitiveness.”

Tsongas met with a small group of residents--including several unemployed workers--at a community center in Flint and faced tough questions that illuminated his problems in connecting with blue-collar voters in this heavily unionized state.

Dale Scanlon, who works at a GM Buick plant here, asked Tsongas how he would respond to unfair trading practices by other countries.

“You’ve got two things to do,” Tsongas said. “One, you’ve got to be tough on the Japanese and the Europeans, but the main thing you’ve got to do is build automobiles here that can compete.”

Tsongas added: “It took a long time for Americans to get around to quality. (Foreign competitors) did before we did and a lot of Americans are not buying American cars.”

Afterward, Scanlon defended the quality of the Buicks built in Flint and said pointedly: “I did not get the impression (Tsongas) understands the difference between fair and free trade.”

Another man in the audience asked Tsongas why he opposed one of organized labor’s top priorities--legislation barring the hiring of permanent replacement workers during strikes.

In explaining his position, Tsongas said: “I’m not going to pander to you, I’m not going to tell you what you want to hear. . . . If I have to make promises, if I have to make commitments to things I don’t believe in, I’d rather go home.”

Clinton’s appearance in Flint was considerably more buoyant; an overflow crowd that spilled out into the parking lot turned out to see him speak at a union hall across the street from a GM V-8 engine plant slated to be closed in the next few years as part of the giant auto maker’s wrenching consolidation.

Clinton criticized GM for planning to close the plant after the union there agreed to changes in work rules, saying such a decision would discourage other unions from cooperating with management to make needed reforms.

But Clinton encountered skepticism as he tried to make the case for continuing negotiations with Mexico on the free-trade agreement.

“If we could build a trading system in Mexico which required them to raise their standards of labor . . . that would cut the gap in the cost of labor between America and there, it would lift their incomes . . . and it would increase their ability to buy American products. So we could both win,” Clinton said.

Dave York, who teaches labor history at the plant under a joint project between GM and the United Auto Workers union, was not persuaded by Clinton’s argument. “What he said might be visionary,” York said. “But I believe we have to stop the influx of our jobs going south before we can look that far ahead.”