Ever since Franklin Roosevelt sat in the white House six decades ago--while Presidents and congressional leaders came and went, wars were won and lost, taxes went up and down--one U.S. tenet has never changed: if you are poor and eligible, you are "entitled" to cash paid by the Federal Government to improve your life. Not anymore.

The New Deal welfare safety net installed in the 1930s and augmented in the Great Society programs of the 1960s has been hauled off for the kind of drastic restitching that France, Germany, Italy and Sweden have been laboring over for the past year or more.

Bill Clinton won the presidency in 1992 after pledging to "end welfare as we know it," then vetoed as excessively harsh two Republican bills to reform the entitlements program. Last week, however, he said he would sign the third and latest proposal, which redesigns the nation's antipoverty program. Within a day of Clinton's endorsement, both houses of Congress voted lopsidedly to approve the legislation, which will affect nearly 13 million people on welfare and more than 25 million who receive food stamps.

"I will sign this bill first and foremost because the current system is broken," Clinton explained, referring to a widespread belief that the old policy encouraged long-term dependency on federal handouts instead of fostering initiative. The new law will turn welfare over to the 50 states, where beneficiaries will be required to find work within two years, be limited to five years of benefits during their lifetime and face stringent restrictions aimed at limiting out-of-wedlock births. Clinton's advisers were deeply split over whether he should approve the bill. But after a 21/2-hour final White House meeting--which included several dismayed and disapproving Cabinet and staff liberals (but not Hillary, who was at the Atlanta Olympics)--Clinton made the most significant domestic-policy decision of his presidency and agreed to the wholesale overhaul. The legislation was not perfect, he conceded, but it was "the best chance we will have in a long, long time" to reform the system, and offered a "historic opportunity to make welfare what it was meant to be--a second chance, not a way of life."

Under the new program, projected to save $55 billion over the first six years, states will receive annual lump-sum payments to run their own work and welfare programs at a minimum of 75% of the 1994 level. Monthly federal payments of cash to needy families will end.

The work component of the legislation is rigorous. Within two months of offering benefits, states can require recipients to perform community service. Within two years of receiving welfare, the family head must begin working or the family loses its benefits. Spending on the fraud-ridden food-stamp program will be cut $27 billion over six years. Able-bodied citizens from 18 to 50 without children will be allowed to receive food stamps for only three months in any three-year period unless they are working.

Legal immigrants who are not U.S. citizens will be all but cut out. Most aid, including nearly all low-income programs, food stamps, Medicaid and disability assistance, will be denied during an immigrant's first five years in the U.S. Those currently receiving benefits will have a year's grace but will then lose their eligibility.

Unwed teenage parents will feel sharp changes. States will provide payments only if an unmarried mother under 18 stays in school and lives with an adult. A single mother receiving state welfare who won't help identify the father of her child will lose at least 25% of her benefits.

Liberals bellowed betrayal. "Where is the compassion?" asked John Lewis, a Democratic Congressman from Georgia. "This bill is mean. It is downright low-down. What does it profit a great nation to conquer the world, only to lose its soul?" Some moderates shared his anguish, but Republicans were unapologetic. "People are not entitled to anything but opportunity," said John Kasich, the conservative chairman of the House Budget Committee. "You can't be on welfare for generations."

The new legislation poses huge problems for some states, such as California, where state law requires counties to provide last-resort services. That will be a nightmare for Los Angeles County, home to more than 300,000 legal immigrants. "This is devastating and will probably bankrupt us," said supervisor Gloria Molina.

The President's decision was a victory for political advisers who feared that, despite his continuing double-digit lead in polls, Clinton's failure to fulfill his 1992 pledge could provide potent ammunition for Republican challenger Robert Dole. The former Senate majority leader had been harshly critical of Clinton's two vetoes, and quickly claimed credit for the conversion. "While I cannot applaud the rationale behind the President's swiftly changing positions, I commend him for finally climbing on board the Dole welfare-reform proposal."

That proposal is headed where the voters are, and for Clinton the move was an unmitigated plus. When President Jacques Chirac tried to cut benefits in France last year, riots erupted and his popularity dipped to a low. Clinton's decision probably clinches his re-election. Americans today no longer wish to carry so much of the burden for those Roosevelt called the "ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished."