When the 108th Congress convenes tomorrow, process will be the priority. While GOP leaders in both chambers will meet to map out their agendas, they must first tackle many housekeeping issues including the selection of committee chairman.

In the House, candidates for full committee chairmanships and for top Appropriations subcommittee positions came before the Republican Steering Committee yesterday and today to explain why they wished to head committees. No decisions are expected before January 8. The Democratic Steering Committee began its own deliberations today as well.

In the Senate, incoming Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (TN) and his leadership team were to meet today to discuss the stalled organizing negotiations with Democratic leader Tom Daschle (SD).

One of the first policy tasks Congress is expected to dispense with when it reconvenes is to quickly push through an extension of unemployment benefits that expired shortly after Christmas. President Bush has called for Congress to speedily pass legislation that would resume the extension of unemployment benefits and apply it retroactively to Dec. 29.

In a few weeks, President Bush is to release his new federal budget. After many years of increases in spending for popular domestic programs, the Administration is putting the government on a restrained, wartime budget which would lessen funding for many domestic programs for the foreseeable future.

In the new budget, the President is calling for domestic spending to be held steady at $316 billion, the same as last year. This excludes spending on homeland security. This policy marks a major adjustment of federal priorities in the face of soaring defense spending, new demands for funds to protect the nation against terrorism and stagnant tax revenue. NOTE: Spending on domestic programs funded in annual appropriations bills rose by about 40% in President Bill Clinton's second term with increases for education, natural resources, job programs, transportation and health research.

Democratic leaders have been expressing displeasure that the administration's main motive for the hold on domestic spending is to offset the revenue lost through the president's 2001 tax cut. They also claim the administration wants to cut spending in order to make room in the budget for further tax cuts and new priorities such as Medicare prescription drug benefit for seniors.

The virtual freeze on domestic spending comes as many governors are lobbying for federal assistance to help them weather one of the worst fiscal crises in years. Federal grants and payments to public schools, local law enforcement agencies, universities, research laboratories and state highway departments are crucial to state budgets, which are mostly forced by state constitutions to be balanced each year.

States have asked the White House for a reduction in payroll taxes to spur local spending and for temporary increases in the federal share of the Medicaid low-income health program, and the administration is considering making some relief part of a broad stimulus plan that would include tax cuts.