Sponsors of a controversial measure to replace $1 currency with a new, gold-colored $1 coin agreed to give the U.S. Mint and the nation’s banks more time to make the change from paper to metal dollars. The maneuver was designed to answer one of the Clinton administration’s primary objections to the legislation, which would mandate the transition within 18 months of enactment of the legislation.

Mint Director Philip N. Diehl told the Senate Banking Committee the change, giving the Mint 30 months or more to strike the new dollars, would make the proposal more palatable. But it will not end the Treasury Department’s objection to the measure, he said.

The American people do not want this coin, Diehl said. He argued the administration believes the public is not ready give up paper money and predicted Americans simply would begin using $2 bills if the government stops printing $1 bills.

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The dollar-coin legislation has been before Congress for eight years, but this year it won endorsement of House Republicans as a cost-savings move. That has energized proponents of the change, which include the vending-machine industry and mining interests, as well as opponents, which include bankers and unions at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing where the currency is manufactured.

Committee Chairman Alfonse M. D’Amato, R-N.Y., opened Thursday’s hearing declaring, This is not an easy issue. You cannot say any side is right or wrong. But by the end of the three-hour session, D’Amato was siding with coin advocates, telling Diehl the projected $456 million-a-year savings from the change was too much money for Congress to ignore.

How do you say that you give up $400 million a year that could be spent on education? On AIDS research? On cancer? he asked. Over 30 years, that’s a lot of money.

Opponents countered that the switch will be another costly fiasco, like the 1979 effort to get Americans to use the Susan B. Anthony dollar. Citing poll after poll, Diehl and other currency advocates argued the public will shun any new effort to force them to use coins instead of currency. Linda F. Golodner, president of the National Consumers League, charged vending-machine operators will jack up prices to take advantage of the new coin, a charge industry officials denied.