Stressing the Presidency Then, many Gorbachev supporters predict, he will hand over his job of party chief to someone trustworthy, and turn his full attention to the presidency.

The third candidate was Anatoly S. Dudarev, the 45-year-old rector of a technological institute in Leningrad who presented himself as a Gorbachev supporter but gave few details of his views.

Even Gorbachev supporters in the hall voiced doubt that such an increase was feasible.

Mr. Yeltsin's ouster left many Gorbachev supporters feeling abandoned and in danger.

The reorganization leaves him and Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze, also a strong Gorbachev supporter, as the primary officials, besides Mr. Gorbachev, in setting foreign policy.

Increasingly, letter-writers ask why Gorbachev supporters were so easily cowed in the three weeks before Pravda responded.

But, though Mr. Gorbachev sees Mr. Grigoryants as "a parasite," Mr. Grigoryants sees himself, at least in part, as a Gorbachev supporter.

Through the first two days of debate, Gorbachev supporters portrayed the proposed weakening of Article 6 of the Constitution as inevitable.

The committee also elected three Gorbachev supporters to full membership in the Politburo.

Heady debates are going on among Gorbachev supporters about what has to be done, and their ideas go very far to much deeper changes in the system than anything mentioned publicly.