Corporate Angst on Capitol Hill

For most of the past six years, being a business lobbyist in Washington has been a cushy assignment. In the laissez-faire atmosphere created by the Reagan Administration, Congress seemed unusually reluctant to put new legislative shackles on America's corporations. But now that the Democrats have regained control of the Senate and the White House's power has been weakened by Iranscam, business finds itself on the defensive. Corporate lobbyists are fighting a bevy of labor-supported bills that might be beneficial to workers but would impose new costs and burdens on corporations. Says Dirk Van Dongen, president of the National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors (N.A.W.): "It is real warfare."

A passel of pending legislation would affect almost every aspect of the relationship between management and workers. If some leading congressional Democrats and their labor-union allies are successful, companies will have to pay a higher minimum wage, provide a Government-mandated menu of health-care benefits for all workers and offer unpaid leave and guaranteed job security to employees who leave work temporarily when they become parents. Other bills would set up new rules governing unionization, plant closings and on-the-job safety.

The flurry of proposals dramatizes the renewed clout of organized labor in the corridors of Congress. Senate Majority Leader Robert Byrd, a West Virginia Democrat, is more receptive when labor buzzes in his ear than was his predecessor, Republican Robert Dole of Kansas. Massachusetts Democrat Edward Kennedy, an avid defender of workers, has replaced the decidedly less sympathetic Utah Republican Orrin Hatch as chairman of the Senate Labor and Human Resources Committee. Democrats who are friendly to or received campaign money from the labor movement are in positions to help along the bulk of the business-related legislation. Boasts AFL-CIO Executive Howard Samuel: "We control the committees and the agenda on the floor."

Recognizing the challenge they face, business groups have mounted a full- court defense. Van Dongen's N.A.W. can delve into a computer bank that lists 10,000 members who have ranked how well they know legislators on a scale from "slightly" to "very well." The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, meanwhile, is organizing a mammoth letter-writing campaign to Congress. Its message: the raft of legislation would drive up business costs while American companies are already losing markets to foreign competitors.