Three days after making that argument, Mr. Starr secretly filed a motion with a different court asking for permission to make an impeachment referral to Congress.

When Mr. Starr filed his impeachment referral last month with Congress, he disclosed the secret motion.

In his impeachment referral, Mr. Starr wrote that "all phases of the investigation are now nearing completion."

While the impeachment referral inflicted considerable political damage, it also had the practical effect of clearing a number of Clinton aides of committing crimes.

It was in late 1997 that Mr. Starr's prosecutors debated whether this evidence justified the sending of an impeachment referral to Congress.

It was unsealed by court order this week because that testimony has since become public knowledge, largely through Mr. Starr's impeachment referral to Congress.

The lawyers accuse Mr. Starr of slanting the case by excluding exculpatory evidence in his impeachment referral to Congress.

But he said that the decision to send an impeachment referral was not made until after the President testified before the grand jury on Aug. 17.

Over his deputies' objections, he insisted on beginning his impeachment referral to Congress with an extended pornographic narrative.

During the Senate race, Mr. D'Amato had repeatedly refused to state his views about the impeachment referral.