SHAKING AND SHAPING UP THE GOP

THREE YEARS ago, a 67-year-old black grandmother from New York came to Washington, leaned on her cane and told the bigwigs in her Republican Party, "If you suckers don't wake up, I'm going to haul your butts into federal court." They didn't, she did, and on Wednesday she won. "I am so happy. Thank God for Judge Richey," Lugenia Gordon told The Post. "You don't know how long I've been fighting these people." What in the world did the Republican National Committee do to get Mrs. Gordon so mad? And why did U.S. District Judge Charles R. Richey, a Nixon appointee, back her up?

Mrs. Gordon presides over a 13-year-old predominantly black group called "Freedom Republicans." The present-day GOP, they feel, is a pale shadow of the party of Abraham Lincoln, William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass, which abolished slavery and gave blacks the vote. Freedom Republicans have been particularly angered by GOP rules, which they contend are biased against blacks and other racial minorities who seek national committee membership or selection as delegates to GOP nominating conventions. In 1988 Mrs. Gordon cited the upcoming convention, which seated 2,277 delegates, only 3.2 percent of whom were black, and a 162-member national committee with only two black members. Freedom Republicans were especially put off by the RNC's practice of compensating for the lack of color on the national committee by relegating blacks and other minorities to nonvoting special interest seats for racially or ethnically exclusive "auxiliaries." Asked Mrs. Gordon in 1988: "If this party is colorblind, how come they can always see well enough to make this committee lily-white?" She was still angry this year, since today's 165-member RNC has only three blacks, all of whom represent the Virgin Islands.

After suffering what she felt were repeated brush-offs for rule changes -- and when she couldn't even get on the committee's agenda last year -- Mrs. Gordon got herself a lawyer. What did he find? The RNC already has taken in more than $10 million in taxpayers' money to spend on this year's national convention. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, of course, bars groups receiving federal funds from engaging in racial discrimination. Mrs. Gordon asked the Federal Elections Committee to put a hold on the money until the GOP changes its rules. The FEC told the judge that civil rights laws don't apply to political parties, so it can't act. Judge Richey disagreed, saying the FEC "does have an obligation to promulgate rules and regulations to insure the enforcement of Title VI." He told the agency to get it done before the August convention. The GOP, which has been busy urging the Democratic Congress to put itself under the ambit of Title VI, is in a snit. All of which may explain why Mrs. Gordon is so happy today.

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