Gifts from minors are the next big campaign loophole.

Recent campaign-finance revelations have focused on the vast and unregulated sums of soft money that flowed through the 1995-96 campaigns. While much of this fund raising was sleazy, most of it was legal. But there is another category of sleazy giving where the law is not murky: "kiddie cash"--contributions made by parents in the name of their children.

The law here is simple. When it comes to hard-money donations, an individual can give only up to $2,000 to a federal campaign during an election cycle. But increasingly, many parents who have "maxed out" seem to be using their children's names to give more. Unless it can be shown convincingly that a child actually directed the gift and controls the money in question, such contributions violate the law. Not only is giving more than $2,000 illegal, but giving money in another person's name is also a violation. Fines range up to twice the size of the gift. If a campaign could be shown to have orchestrated such a "kiddie-cash" drive, the penalties are even more severe--up to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine for each count of "conspiracy to lie to the government." A confidential Democratic National Committee fund-raising memo warned of the peril: "Reporting a contribution from someone in the name of someone else is a very serious offense--often resulting in criminal liability."

T he law notwithstanding, candidates in both parties have stepped up their kiddie-cash collections. Contributions of more than $1,000 from persons listed as "students" in Federal Election Commission records have more than. In the 1993-94 cycle, Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., set the record for such collections: $65,000. In the run-up to the last presidential election, Clinton's campaign took in more than $200,000 in kiddie cash, outscoring his opponent almost 6-to-1 (Bob Dole, who raised similar amounts of hard money, raised some $35,000 from kids last year).

The Gupta family of Omaha, Neb., is among the more generous sources of student cash. Vinod Gupta is the founder and CEO of American Business Information. Campaign gifts totaling $143,000 tied him at No. 135 on the Mother Jones list of top contributors. His sons, Jess (age 17), Benjamin (14), and Alexander (11), gave an additional $12,000. All this went to two campaigns--Clinton's and Nebraska Gov. Ben Nelson's--in which the senior Gupta had reached his maximum.

Jess, a student at Philips Exeter Academy, freely admits he had nothing to do with the donations. "Dad makes those donations in my name," he says. Vinod Gupta insists his son was misquoted.

In fact, all the money came from trust funds set up in the names of the children, according to their father. This is a common practice among the kiddie-cash set. Yet the FEC has ruled in the past that donations from a source over which the donor does not have sole control are illegal.

T he Guptas are not alone in their familial largess. According to FEC records, at least 25 and perhaps 50 of the top 400 political donors last year (two in the top 10) were joined by one or more children or grandchildren, from preteens to grad students, in giving to their favorite candidates. These earned four White House sleepovers, eight White House coffees, two trade missions, and four memberships to the Republican Party's Team 100.

Smaller givers are in good company as well. Among the somewhat less generous parents and other relatives of kiddie donors are Clinton Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles, the winemaking Gallos, the Florida sugar-cane Fanjuls, Wall Street billionaire George Soros, and former Tennessee Gov. Lamar Alexander.

Typical of a large-scale kiddie-cash operation are the Bransons of Dallas (No. 91 on the Mother Jones list). The Branson kids, Buck, Frank L. IV, and Jennifer, were listed as students on $10,000 worth of FEC filings, donations that added to their trial-lawyer parents' $175,304. All the money went to candidates to whom their parents had already donated.

T he take may be even larger than the "student" donor tally indicates. A cross-check of names and addresses of known student donors with persons who left the "occupation" spot in other FEC filings blank (or listed college names/other employment) revealed another $800,000 in gifts from the same donors. The 17-year-old Jess Gupta (male student), for example, is listed as a "housewife" in another filing. The group of "student" donors who collectively gave $200,000 to Clinton used different designations when contributing an additional $100,000 to him and others.