APnc 06/11 0634 Far Right By MITCHELL LANDSBERG Associated Press Writer NEW YORK (AP) -- T

APnc 06/11 0634 Far Right

   By MITCHELL LANDSBERG Associated Press Writer

   NEW  YORK  (AP)  --  The  Reagan  administration  has been the
toughest foe the extreme right has  faced  in  decades,  in  part
because  it has provided a mainstream alternative to conservative
fanaticism, a report says.

   The administration also has brought more right-wing extremists
to  trial  than  any  other  since  World  War   II,   said   the
Anti-Defamation   League   of  B'nai  B'rith,  a  Jewish  service
organization.

   "The hate movement is weaker today than in  many  years,"  the
ADL said  in  Wednesday's  report.  It gave credit to "the superb
job done by the Justice Department and law enforcement  agencies"
and to "the good sense and decency" of most Americans.

   The  report, "The Hate Movement Today: A Chronicle of Violence
and Disarray," focuses on such groups as the Ku  Klux  Klan,  the
Order,  Posse  Comitatus,  the Aryan Nations and various neo-Nazi
organizations.

   Such groups reached a peak of popularity in 1981 and have been
declining since, the report said.

   The ADL said the Reagan administration's  conservative  social
and  cultural  values  have "tended to undermine whatever base of
popular support the far right had begun to acquire."

   "The tendancy ot extremist groups is to thrive when there  are
administrations  in  Washington  that  represent  the opposite of
their views," said Irwin Suall,  fact-finding  director  for  the
ADL.

   He  said the Reagan administration appeals to the "sympathetic
constituency" of the  far  right  --  people  who  might  support
extremist  groups  without  becoming  heavily  involved  in their
activities.

   As a result, the far right has been pared down to  "hardbitten
ideologues  and  fanatics"  who  would oppose anyone in the White
House, he said.  And the federal government has responded harshly
to their growing penchant for violence.

   The report catalogued a long list of  criminal  cases  against
far  right  groups for such activities as synagogue firebombings,
the slaying of Denver radio talk show  host  Alan  Berg,  illegal
paramilitary   training   and   conspiracies   to  overthrow  the
government.

   "Not since the Roosevelt administration's wartime  indictments
of  Axis  sympathizers  on  charges  of  sedition  have  so  many
far-right extremists been placed on trial," the report said.

   It said extremist groups have been energized by recent  events
in  Forsyth  County,  Ga.,  where  demonstrations by civil rights
groups brought an outpouring of resentment from local whites, and
in the Howard Beach section of Queens,  where  a  black  man  was
struck  and  killed by a car after he and his companions were set
upon by a white gang.

   However, the ADL said  these  incidents  "have  provided  only
brief periods of enthusiasm for activists rather than any lasting
build-up in the ranks of the Klan and neo-Nazi groups involved."

   The  report  said  the Ku Klux Klan, which has splintered into
three major factions, has been reduced to a nationwide membership
of between 4,500 and 5,500, a decline of as much  as  25  percent
suring the past 2 1/2 years and the lowest total in 14 years.

   The  neo-Nazi  movement,  which  has  become divided since the
heyday of the American Nazi Party under George Lincoln  Rockwell,
can  claim  only  about  400  to  450 members, a drop of 10 to 20
percent in the past 2 1/2 year, according to the ADL.

   It offered no comparative figures for the  various  "Christian
Identity"  groups  that  have  captured headlines in the past few
years: the Order, Posse Comitatus, the Arizona Patriots  and  the
Covenant, the  Sword  and  the  Arm  of  the  Lord.   However, it
indicated that these groups, too, are in decline.

   
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