A few hours after anti-smoking legislation died in the Senate last week, President Clinton was philosophical as he spoke to a group of architects at an awards banquet on the White House South Lawn.

In last week's tobacco showdown, Clinton faced a pivotal moment for determining which of those categories will describe his administration in 1998. As months of quiet negotiations over Clinton's foremost domestic initiative of the year ended Wednesday in a noisy eruption of threats and blame-casting, the president found himself cornered by both Republican intransigence and his own inability to summon a governing coalition for the centrist agenda he laid out with great flourish six months ago.

The more likely scenario, many predict, is that official Washington will remain idle on the policy front between now and the midterm elections this fall. In the meantime, the White House and congressional Democrats will likely wage war with Republicans: Both sides already are employing precisely the sort of destructive partisan rhetoric Clinton has often said he deplores.