THEODORE ROOSEVELT POISED TO CELEBRATE

President Bill Clinton has moved to the top of the domestic agenda the debate over national health care that began at the turn of the century. Back then a diverse group of advocates -- including President Theodore Roosevelt and the American Medical Association (AMA) -- began calling for government-paid health insurance for all Americans.

A long, at times fierce battle has ensued, swinging between populist appeals for a significant government role in health care and conservative calls for a private, free market, non-governmental approach.

Here are some of the milestones in the health care debate that has spanned the 20th century:

1910-1919: Bills were introduced in several state legislatures to cover workers and dependents in state-administered plans financed by employers, employees and state taxes.

1933: The American Hospital Association came forth with its new plan, Blue Cross hospital insurance. The AMA objected. Nonetheless, private health insurance, as we now know it, was born.

1935: President Franklin Roosevelt endorsed the principle of compulsory national health insurance, citing his cousin Theodore as a great innovator in the field. However, he did not submit legislation on the subject, preferring to focus on New Deal economic recovery matters.

1943: Senators Robert Wagner (D., NY) and James Murray (D., MT), along with Congressman John Dingell (D., MI -- father of today's Congressman), introduced their national health insurance bill. It called for a payroll tax on employers and employees. The same bill was introduced in Congress for several years and went nowhere.

1945: President Harry Truman took up the health care fight and submitted a bill similar to the Wagner-Murray-Dingell bill. The AMA launched an extensive public relations campaign against "socialized medicine."

1960: John F. Kennedy campaigned in support of health care for all the elderly financed through Social Security.

1965: President Lyndon Johnson takes up the Kennedy campaign pledge and guided Medicare and Medicaid through Congress -- over the strenuous opposition ("socialized medicine") of the AMA.

1974: President Richard Nixon proposed his Comprehensive Health Insurance Program which included a mandate that all employers must cover their workers. Senator Edward Kennedy (D., MA) endorsed the Nixon proposal and sought to broaden the coverage. As the Watergate scandal grew deeper, the Nixon proposal was ignored.

1990: The AMA reversed its traditional opposition to overall national health care plans. Specifically, AMA supported the need for a program providing universal coverage and providing a mandate requiring all employers to cover their employees. (Last week, the AMA reversed itself again and moved to "neutral" on the issue of employer-mandated payments.)

1991: In a special Senate election in Pennsylvania, unknown Democratic challenger Harris Wofford was drafted to run against one of the most popular figures in Pennsylvania history, former Governor Richard Thornburgh. Wofford pitched his campaign on the single issue of heath care and came from 40 points behind to win by 10. After the election in Pennsylvania, President Bush states he will soon introduce a health plan of his own.

1992: President Bush introduced a "voluntary" national health plan. The Democratic candidates for President declared support for a more sweeping universal health care program.

1993: President Clinton appointed his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, to head a task force to produce a health care program. Mrs. Clinton's program called for universal coverage, mandated employers to provide care to all employees and established health care "alliances" designed to compete under the concept of "managed care." Senator John Chafee (R., RI) introduced a Republican alternative that called for universal coverage, but opposed employer mandates. Conservative Democrats introduced a "less than universal, but all we can afford" plan leaving basic health care practices in the hands of the insurance companies.

1994: After almost a century of discussing a national health care program, Congress undertakes to bring a health plan to a vote. President Clinton will have to compromise on his plan, as will the Republicans on theirs. Neither party can afford to go into the November, 1994 election as the party that couldn't or wouldn't deliver on health care. Theodore Roosevelt's dream becomes reality -- a hundred years late.