LEAD:  Saudis to Join Atom Pact  Riyadh will join the treaty limiting the spread of nuclear weapons, the Saudi press agency said. No details or signing date were given. Page A10.  Navy Submarine Burns  Explosions and fire on a 30-year-old Navy submarine in the Atlantic injured 23 men aboard.

INSIDE

LEAD: LASERS, which have become nearly as common as guns in modern armies, are making battlefields so dangerous for friends as well as foes that arms makers are racing to devise new shields against them.

Lasers for the Battlefield Raise Concern for Eyesight

LEAD: The first round of balloting in France's two-stage presidential election Sunday did more than designate President Francois Mitterrand as the odds-on favorite for victory in two weeks. It signaled, in the apt metaphor of Jean-Marie Le Pen, the exultant leader of the ultra-right National Front, ''a political earthquake.

France at Crossroads; Le Pen Vote Shatters Unity of Right And Threatens Nation's Social Peace

LEAD: The Long Island Power Authority today increased by $137 million its $7.45 billion bid to buy the Long Island Lighting Company, voting to raise its offer for Lilco's common shares to $10 from $8.75.

L.I. Authority Raises Offer To Buy Lilco

LEAD: Major oil producers from inside and outside the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries will meet in Vienna on Tuesday to try to fashion an agreement on controlling production and bolstering the price of oil.

OPEC and Non-Members Will Meet Today on Prices

BUSINESS DIGEST

LEAD: April is budget time, and the mood is sour. Indignation over ever-growing taxes is rising, especially among older people who arrived long before the condominiums and subdivisions that increasingly dot the farmland here.

A Town Grows, and So Do Tax Battles

LEAD: For the last eight years, the weed-strewn field across from Norman Borra's Mobil station has been empty. It has stayed empty because this hamlet and the rest of Huntington Township has opposed the construction of 162 apartments for poor people there. Apartments and poor people would ruin the neighborhood, residents say.

Our Towns; Subsidized Units And Slow Death Of Stereotypes

LEAD: The three-month takeover battle for J. P. Stevens & Company closed yesterday with an agreement that will end one of the nation's oldest corporate dynasties.

3-Month Battle for J.P. Stevens Ends

LEAD: Administration officials asserted today that the Senate would not pass trade legislation with enough votes to override a veto. But the Democratic leadership continued to hunt for support, putting pressure on oil-state Republicans.

Maneuvering On Trade Bill Intensifies

LEAD: A FESTERING water dispute here is forcing environmentalists to choose between saving an endangered fish and preserving one of the country's most vital rest stops for migrating shorebirds.

The Dilemma: Save a Fish or a Wetland?

LEAD: FREE radicals, highly reactive chemicals believed to have given rise to life on earth, are now increasingly regarded as primary forces of destruction and death in nearly all living things.

Natural Chemicals Now Called Major Cause Of Disease

LEAD: The American Telephone and Telegraph Company said yesterday that Vittorio Cassoni would step down as head of the company's computer division and return to Olivetti of Italy, which had lent the executive to A.T.&T. to turn around sagging personal computer sales.

A.T.&T. and Olivetti: Strained Relationship

LEAD: John Demjanjuk was sentenced to death today by the Israeli court that found him to be the brutal Nazi death camp guard known as Ivan the Terrible.

DEMJANJUK GIVEN DEATH SENTENCE FOR NAZI KILLINGS

LEAD: The International Business Machines Corporation said yesterday that it would probably sell its 16 percent stake in the MCI Communications Corporation over the next several years, a move that analysts said reflected a strengthened and more independent MCI.

I.B.M. Says It May Sell MCI Stake

LEAD: One of the most promoted economic ideas of the 1980's holds that private companies can provide public services more efficiently than government.

Public Services Found Better If Private Agencies Compete

LEAD: Disco, funk and rap engulfed the dance floor. Spotlights swirled and darted to the beat. And soda and ''near beer'' flowed at the packed bar of Studio 54.

No Liquor but Still Exotic: A Night Life for the Young

LEAD: The White House Working Group on the market crash is likely to produce a set of proposals that will closely track the broad recommendations made in January by the Brady commission, with one key exception, an Administration official said today.

Reagan Group Is Likely to Back Broad Proposals on Stock Crash

LEAD: As people here look to Tuesday's Presidential primary, they say they no longer expect much from their Government. They point to the closed steel works of Western Pennsylvania brooding on the bank of the Monongahela, visible in the clear air, no longer obscured by the acrid smoke of prosperity.

Steel City Tires of Politics and Promises

LEAD: In an extraordinary action, the Supreme Court decided today to reconsider the rights of minorities to sue private parties for racial discrimination under a post-Civil War statute.

COURT, 5-4, VOTES TO RESTUDY RIGHTS IN MINORITY SUITS

LEAD: Five major oil companies yesterday reported higher first-quarter profits, mostly because of increased earnings from chemical operations and improved margins in their oil refining and marketing businesses.

Profits Rise At 5 Big Oil Companies

LEAD: Afghanistan's leader, Najibullah, offered today to create a demilitarized zone through which Afghan refugees could return home from Pakistan as Soviet troops withdraw.

Afghan Leader Offers a Pullback; Envoys Say He Is Being Defeated

LEAD: Wendell Niles, a graphic artist who founded his own company, was telling a group of seventh graders from Harlem recently that there were all kinds of jobs for them.

Theme for Today, Class: Role Models and How to Succeed

LEAD: Jai alai frontons in Hartford and Bridgeport, in the 11th day of a players' strike, were shut down today by the Connecticut Division of Special Revenue after complaints of strikers harassing fans and replacement players.

2 Jai Alai Frontons Closed By Connecticut Amid Strike

LEAD: On Friday the Campeau Corporation, the Canadian developer, will take control of Federated Department Stores Inc., the largest operator of department stores in the United States. The completion of the $6.6 billion takeover concludes an 11-week battle in which Campeau bested R.H. Macy & Company. Campeau agreed to allow Macy to buy two Federated divisions, Bullocks-Bullock's Wilshire and I.

April 26, 1988

Headlines from April 26, 1988

INSIDE

Lasers for the Battlefield Raise Concern for Eyesight

France at Crossroads; Le Pen Vote Shatters Unity of Right And Threatens Nation's Social Peace

L.I. Authority Raises Offer To Buy Lilco

OPEC and Non-Members Will Meet Today on Prices

Billboard 200

Dirty Dancing

Bad

More Dirty Dancing

Faith

Kick

Historical Context for April 26, 1988