NATION
CLINTON'S FIRST VETO
President Clinton actually carried out his threat and cast his first veto, against a spending-cuts measure that would have stripped $16.4 billion from current expenditures. "I cannot in good conscience sign a bill that cuts education to save pet congressional projects," said the President. The Republican-sponsored legislation would have trimmed a host of social programs in the current budget while continuing to funnel funds for certain road and courthouse projects. Lacking the votes for an override, G.O.P. leaders said they would try to craft a compromise bill with the President.
SENATE FIGHTS TERRORISM
By a vote of 91 to 8, the Senate adopted a broad package of antiterrorism measures after the President and Republican leaders settled their differences over the plan. The bill includes some $2 billion for stepped-up counterterrorism programs, broadened wiretapping authority (a presidential request) and -- most controversial of all -- a limit of one federal habeas corpus appeal for most prisoners on death row (a Republican request). The House is expected to act soon on similar legislation.
A GOVERNOR INDICTED
Following through on a peripheral investigation, Whitewater independent counsel Kenneth Starr obtained a federal indictment against Arkansas Governor Jim Guy Tucker, accusing him of submitting a false loan application and of conspiring to defraud the irs in connection with a complex cable-TV deal. Tucker denied any wrongdoing. In a separate development, the counsel obtained a guilty plea from Stephen Smith, a former Clinton gubernatorial aide, for conspiring to misapply loan funds. Neither the Tucker charges nor the Smith plea implicate either the President or Hillary Rodham Clinton.
NUCLEAR BLACK-MARKET STING
Capping a yearlong sting operation, federal authorities in New York arrested three men on charges of storing nearly 8 tons of zirconium -- a material used to make nuclear weapons -- and trying to sell part of it to undercover agents posing as Iraqi-backed arms merchants. The ease with which the zirconium was obtained should serve as a dramatic "wake-up call," said the FBI.
THE SIMPSON TRIAL
The O.J. Simpson double-murder trial got down to the stomach-wrenching details of the crime itself. The prosecution introduced graphic autopsy pictures of the victims, as the county coroner described in meticulous detail how the wounds and brutal knife gashes were inflicted. In a familiar and increasingly troubling development, two more jurors were replaced; only two alternates remain.
THE REAL SLICK WILLIE
California Democrat Willie Brown did it again. Having only recently outmaneuvered a Republican majority to remain the state assembly speaker, Brown outflanked the G.O.P. one last time before stepping down from the post he has held for 15 years. Capitalizing on the parties' even split of the current chamber, Brown recruited a dissident Republican, Doris Allen, to take over his job, put her over the top with the votes of all Democrats and then got himself appointed "speaker emeritus" -- a position that will allow him to "assist" the new speaker while he focuses on running for mayor of San Francisco. Allen is the first woman to hold the post.
CAPITAL CURFEW