June 18, 1993

Two drivers whose licenses the police said had each been suspended more than 200 times were arrested this week, the latest of more than 1,500 motorists taken into custody under a two-month-old crackdown. The two were stopped for minor traffic violations: one made a turn without signaling, the other took an illegal shortcut through a service station parking lot. But when the officers who pulled them over ran computer checks on their licenses, they discovered that the two had been stopped time and again but had never appeared in court.

When a panel of experts recently described the Harriet Tubman Elementary School as an "island of excellence," it was referring to education in a city where too many public schools get failing grades. But the characterization was apt for another reason. Physically and socially, Tubman is as isolated as any island, a 19th-century pile of red brick on South 10th Street, just north of what remains of the Springfield Avenue shopping district. From any vantage point across weed-choked lots or from windows of the occasional row house, Tubman stands alone, a redoubt against a sea of urban problems -- and arguably one of the best-run elementary schools in the state.

A capital gains tax increase? Tax analysts are buzzing over a seemingly minor provision in the Senate Finance Committee's hastily cobbled budget proposal presented on Wednesday. For wedged in among the big-ticket items -- ranging from the 4.3 cent gasoline tax to the Medicare reimbursement cuts -- is an effective increase in the maximum tax rate on capital gains to 30.8 percent from 28 percent for those who pay most of the capital gains.

Confounding forecasters, the nation's trade deficit widened again in April, to $10.49 billion, as the imbalance with Japan climbed to its highest level in five and a half years and its third highest on record. The Commerce Department report is likely to increase trade friction between the two countries as President Clinton prepares for the Tokyo economic summit meeting of top industrialized nations in less than three weeks.

Democrats Begin Pushing Budget Toward Full Senate Ignoring Republican attacks about raising taxes, the 11 Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee began muscling the first big chunk of President Clinton's budget package toward a vote by the full Senate. Page A20. Surge in the Trade Deficit The trade deficit widened again in April, to $10.49 billion, as the imbalance with Japan hit its highest level in five and a half years. Page D1. Political Struggle in Japan Japan's Prime Minister faces pressure to call an election because of political warfare over cleaning up the nation's electoral system. Page A11. Vanishing Court Records The Supreme Court will hear a case testing the right of litgants to agree that all records of a lawsuit should be permanently erased. Law, page D17.