ROUND UP THE "GOOD OL' BOYS"

While Waco andWhitewater hearingscompete for the Capitol Hill spotlight, lawmakers have managed to find a place on the broadcast agenda for another justice and Treasury department probe: the "Good Ol' Boy" hearings. Senate Judiciary Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), who convened the inquiry today, said sealed affidavits claimed rape and narcotics use may have occurred at one of the "Good Ol' Boys Roundups," an annual gathering staged for federal, state and local law enforcement officers since 1980 in rural Tennessee. Making matters worse, two black agents ofthe Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, one retired and one active, depicted Roundup organizer Gene Rightmyer as a man who went out of his way to insult blacks. One of them, Larry Stewart, said Rightmyer approached three black agents in 1985 and "without any provocation . . . stated, 'You were born trash, you'll live and die trash.'" Other law officers who had attended the gatherings -- including blacks -- testified that racism had never been tolerated there. The Clinton Administration is investigating the allegations.