January 29, 1982

The line begins forming at 9:30 A.M., and sometimes stretches down the block, past the movie theater and around the corner. But it is frigid outside on a recent Friday, and shortly before 10 A.M. only a handful of people are huddling in the dingy corridor near the freight elevators. The telephone rings. ''O.K., Al,'' says the voice on the other end, ''let's get those kids up here.'' It is open viewing day at Henri Bendel, the chic women's specialty store at 57th Street and Fifth Avenue. Every Friday morning, the buyers at Bendel's open their doors to hopeful young - and not so young - designers. Established designers and manufacturers are able to see the buyers by appointment during the week. The custom of open viewing was int roduced b y Jean Rosenberg, now the merchandise director, when she came to Be ndel's 25 years ago, andhas since been adopted by buyers at some othe r New York stores, such as Bergdorf Goodman's. But Bendel's, traditio nally on the leading edge of fashion, observes it more faithfully than most. '' The broader our layer of special merchandise that is at no pla ce else, the better Bendel's is for women to shop at,'' said Gerald ine Stutz, the store's president. 'Cautious Purchases'

Officials in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut believe President Reagan's ''new federalism'' proposals hold potentially devastating consequences for their states and for New York City, even though the Reagan Administration insists that there would be no winners or losers. According to Brad T. Johnson, the director of the New York State office in Washington, even if the arithmetic shows that a state would gain by the President's plan for the Federal Government to assume Medicaid costs in return for the states taking over the food-stamp program and Aid to Families with Dependent Children, the gain would be subtracted from each state's share of the $28 billion trust fund proposed by Mr. Reagan. The trust fund is designed to provide the states with money to help pay for a total of 43 programs - such as urban mass transit and urban development -that the states would assume, starting in 1984. According to the White House, the fund would be divided between the states according to their share from the Federal Government in the fiscal years 1979 to 1981, less whatever financial gain a state had made on the Medicaid exchange.

The winning political coalition that President Reagan put together in Congress last year is threatened by widespread uneasiness among Republicans as well as Democrats over the huge bud get deficits contemplated by the Administration. The President sought in his State of the Union Message to put the main focus on his proposals for shifting Federal programs to the states. But many of his Congressional supporters have indicated that the deficit remains their top priority. And they say they are not satisfied with Administration projections of deficits approaching $100 billion.

The nation's merchandise trade deficit narrowed in December to $1.59 billion, the smallest since July, mostly because the recession reduced imports more sharply than exports, the Commerce Department said today. But for all of 1981, the deficit widened to $39.7 billion, the third-largest on record, despite a big reduction in oil imports. David Lund, a Commerce Department economist, said of the December deficit, ''The underlying thing was weakness in the economy, and that's still operating.''

''Marvelous, O.K., police.'' - Gen. James L. Dozier, to Italian rescuers. (A8:5.)