• • FIR WEST Sth AlISIIN TixAS ;11701 ourier-Times Televranh sEp 2 4 1982 510 Clements 'Justified' In 'Attack HOU.. — Gov. Bill Ch4nenfs s ys his staff was justified i mentioning his opponent's drunken driv- ing arrest 19 years ago and his secretary of state acted correctly in releasing a list. of "possible convicted felons." clme,aho held a news conrerence --Thursday after addressing Texas Southern University's fall convoca- tion. said Texas Attorney General Mark White's 1963 arrest for driffiriTC-TMing is a part of his background. HE said "the public has a right to know" about the inci- dent in Athens, when White was a 23-year-old Baylor Uni- versity law student. The Clements campaign newsletter, the Texas Specta- tor, chronicled the episode under the headline, "He Showed His Talent Early." "If the heat in the kitchen is too hot, you ought not to be in there cooking," Clements said. White denounced the attack as "the sleaziest campaign tactic I have ever seen." Mu- nicipal court records show White paid a $50 fine to a re- duced charge of public intoxi- cation. Clements also defended Secretary of Slate d _Davi Dean: _who last week prompt- ericrcats of a libel lawsuit by releasing a list. of 28,000 "possible convicted felons" on the state voter registration rolls. "This list came out of the Department of Pliblic Safety computer," s;nd Clements. who said he u.,-171,4 ,,xpect in, formation from that source to be accurate. But Col. Jim Adams, DPS directril7; rnmputer tape supplied to Dean's office also listed people convicted of certain types of mis- demeanors. Jerry Angerman, a Demo- cratic candidate for an Austin state representative seat whose name was included on the list, has said he will file a libel suit against Dean. Clements predicted in the news conference at the mostly black school that he would approximately double his support among blacks com- pared to the 1978 election. He polled 16 percent of that vote. "I would suggest you talk to some black voters," he re- torted when asked to explain why. Clements said three polls show im leading by margins of 7 -rit to 13 percent., but ri to say who ran two of the surveys. He said one was his own. lie denied that there had been friction between him rIttisd, Rwehpof ranivr.reiweemiLl fig- ourvariarar_tnevinin urea showing Clements trail- ing WIle.„,,,c..1.e.gi.ezts said he nevrriquested a reason "for whatever purposes that he did it and for whatever pur- poses that his poll was so poor." Clements spoke to about 1,750 students and faculty members at the mostly black school in an auditorium deco- rated with posters by a local Clements campaign organiza- tion. "Most. of all, we need lead- ership that. cares for Texas and works for Texas — not some career politician who's spent his lifetime wasting taxpayers' money to further his own ambitions," said Clement,. who did not men- tion White by name during the speech. Under the current adminis- tration, Clements told the group, the Texas Southern two-year budget is 47 percent larger than ever before.