AP--The only drama in yesterday's Midwestern primaries was whether Senate Majority Leader Robert J. Dole could win Michigan and Wisconsin by wide enough margins to clinch the nomination.

Eager not to make next week's California contest anticlimactic, the Dole camp said it would not claim victory regardless of yesterday's results. Still, Dole knew the prize that eluded him in two prior White House bids would soon be his. "I think this virtually locks it up," Dole told the Associated Press. "...It is 230 days to defeating Bill Clinton. The first time I came up empty. The last time I came up short. This time I'm coming up full."

At stake were 67 delegates in Ohio, 59 in Illinois, 57 in Michigan and 36 in Wisconsin--219 in all. Based on preliminary results yesterday, Dole had 951 delegates in The Associated Press count--drawing near the 996 necessary to clinch nomination. Buchanan, by comparison, had but 86 delegates.

Buchanan's best hope to slow Dole was in Michigan, the only one of the four states that allocated its delegates in direct proportion to the results rather than on a winner-take-all basis.

These industrial battlegrounds are likely to be pivotal come November. Yesterday's results showed Dole getting 67 percent in Ohio, to 17 percent for Buchanan. Illinois was 61 percent for Dole and 24 percent for Buchanan. Early Michigan returns had Dole with 53 percent, Buchanan 34 percent--his best showing of the primary season.

In a festive mood, the Senate majority leader joked with Virginia second-graders visiting the halls of Congress on a school field trip.

Later, he tested themes against Clinton, recalling the incumbent had promised to balance the budget, cut taxes and reform welfare. The Senate majority leader said the Republican Congress had tried to deliver on each of those fronts and "he's vetoed it."

Dole had every reason to be in good spirits. Just a month ago, he lost New Hampshire to conservative columnist Patrick S. Buchanan and went on to lose three of the first five primaries. But, with Wisconsin still up in the air yesterday, he had piled up a 21-0 primary record since, and added a couple of caucus victories to boot. "Part of our strategy, of course, early on was to lose New Hampshire," Dole joked.

In addition, a national poll released yesterday showed Dole moving to within eight points of Clinton in a head-to-head matchup.

"Now that we have a clear candidate that will tighten up even more," Dole told the AP. "We're going to be hard at work convincing the American people we have the right agenda for the next generation and the next century."

Even as Dole had reason to be hopeful about his November prospects, there were suggestions the ballot could get more crowded. Ross Perot's Reform Party was intensifying its efforts to qualify for presidential ballots--and Perot himself said flatly that he would run and "give it everything I have" if drafted as its nominee.