George Bush looked more than a little relieved. After two years of stalling, his top aides had finally worked out a civil rights compromise with Congress -- and none too soon. Bush hardly relished the prospect of vetoing a civil rights bill in the same fortnight that the Senate nearly disintegrated over the Clarence Thomas nomination and an ex-Klansman named David Duke became the Republican Party candidate in Louisiana's gubernatorial runoff.
The President said for months that he wouldn't sign a bill requiring businesses to resort to quotas to avoid discrimination suits. The breakthrough was engineered by Senator John Danforth, the...