“President Bush will call Tuesday for tougher criminal penalties for corporate executives convicted of fraud, an initiative that he hopes will ease a crisis of investor confidence without inviting an avalanche of new legislation,” writes Jeanne Cummings in today’s Wall Street Journal

“The new penalties for fraud could include longer prison sentences for corporate officers, either by extending the maximum penalties under current law or by allowing judges to require those convicted to serve longer portions of their sentences, a senior administration official said. The president also is expected to renew his call for legislation requiring top executives to swear to the veracity of public financial disclosures in a move similar to a recent Securities and Exchange Commission order.”

“In a speech to be delivered Tuesday to a group of corporate executives at a Wall Street hotel, Mr. Bush also will propose significant increases in funding for the regulatory agencies charged with policing America’s corporations and demand that the money be used to ensure strict enforcement of laws already on the books, officials said.”

“Mr. Bush is expected to defend the vast majority of corporate officers, saying most haven’t been swept up in the kinds of corporate and accounting misdeeds that began tumbling into the open late last year following the collapse of Enron Corp.”

“Most CEOs are ‘good, honorable, honest people who have nothing to hide,’ Mr. Bush said Monday at a White House news conference, where he was peppered with questions about corporate governance. ‘It’s the few that … have created the stains that we must deal with.’ Mr. Bush also rose to the defense of Harvey Pitt, a Bush appointee as SEC chairman who is now under attack from some Democrats and Republicans, saying the chairman has been ‘fast to act.’ “

“Mr. Bush’s dual themes — a tough response but a problem limited to a few bad apples — are important to a White House strategy for dealing with the current crisis in investor confidence that has followed a slew of corporate scandals and has driven stock markets to levels below those seen in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.”