Hill Gets $8 Mil

New York Sen.-elect Hillary Rodham Clinton agreed Friday to accept an $8 million book deal with publisher Simon & Schuster for a memoir on her eight tumultuous years in the White House.

"This personal perspective on our recent history promises to be one of the most remarkable books of our time," said Carolyn Reidy, president of the publishing house's trade division. Simon & Schuster has published Mrs. Clinton's other three books. Simon and Schuster is a unit of Viacom, which also owns CBS.

The memoir will be published in early 2003.

A White House official also confirmed the deal late Friday.

The huge advance is the highest ever paid to a member of Congress and comes close to matching the $8.5 million Pope John Paul II received in 1994, a non-fiction record. It also tops the $7.1 million received this summer by General Electric chairman Jack Welch.

There is intense interest in the first lady's memoir because she has indicated she would address her husband's impeachment and his affair with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

Aside from the high price of the contract, the deal is unusual, publishing officials say, because Clinton is seeking a large part of the payment upfront – before she's sworn in as New York's junior senator on January 3. Such advances are typically spread out in a series of payments over the course of a book's publication.

While Clinton hasn't collected a penny of that money yet, or even begun work on the book, watchdog groups are already raising questions about the propriety of the deal.

In the Senate, book advances are not included among restrictions on outside income as long as the arrangement is "usual and customary."

But Meredith McGeehee, vice president of the watchdog group Common Cause, said there was nothing "usual or customary" about a deal of that price.

"It gives the appearance that someone is cashing in," she said.

Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson said the first lady was complying with all Senate rules and would donate a portion of the book's proceeds to charity.

"We are gratified by the interest shown by so many publishing houses and it clear that the market for this book is very strong," Wolfson said.

Gary Ruskin of the Congressional Accountability Project, a group affiliated with consumer advocate Ralph Nader, urged Clinton to forsake an advance and take only royalties. He also said the Senate should adopt stricter rules on book advances, similar to those adopted in the House in the wake of a 1994 controversy involving a $4.5 million book deal signed by then incoming-House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

Gingrich's arrangement with Rupert Murdoch's HarperCollins came under scrutiny when it was revealed that before the deal was signed Gingrich met with Murdoch and a top lobbyist for his Fox television network. At the time, the Federal Communications Commission was looking at whethr Fox was foreign-owned, in violation of its rules.

Facing bipartisan criticism, Gingrich eventually retreated and said he would settle for a token $1 advance in addition to royalties.

On Thursday, Simon & Schuster released an e-book biography for children of President-elect George W. Bush.