Foreign-Aid Pasting

Said House Minority Leader Joe Martin last week to Speaker Sam Rayburn, "This is one issue where we see eye to eye." What the two House veterans saw was the Administration's $3.8 billion foreign-aid authorization bill finally emerging from committee. Slashed by $227 million in the Senate, the bill seemed likely to fare far worse in a House still riled by the Administration--and Supreme Court --decision to turn Army Specialist William Girard over to the Japanese for trial (TIME, July 22).

The bill's most dangerous opponent was Ohio's Frank Bow, who threatened to tack on it what the House calls "The Bow thing"--a resolution to scrap U.S. status-of-forces agreements (TIME. June 17), which govern the arrangements for law enforcement for U.S. troops overseas. Waving off all remonstrances, Bow did experience at the last moment a tactical change of heart. He decided to save his amendment for the actual appropriation bill, where it would be more potent. But Texas Democrat Omar Burleson grabbed the issue, offered a "sense of Congress" amendment calling on the President to revise the status-of-forces agreements to give the U.S. exclusive jurisdiction over U.S. servicemen who commit offenses while on duty overseas. Loaded with homeside political dynamite, it was a tough bill for a Congressman to vote against, was defeated by a rare tie (134-134).

When it came to the basics of the bill that Rayburn and Martin had pledged themselves to save--the provision for long-term economic aid and the Administration's request for $3.8 billion in foreign-aid funds--the House's Big Two, and the President, too, took a real pasting. The Senate had agreed to a three-year foreign-aid economic-development program, had authorized $2 billion to finance it. The rebellious House, unimpressed by a special presidential plea (snapped Iowa Republican H. R. Gross: "I took my last marching orders in 1916-19"), limited this key Administration program to one year, authorized only $500 million to get it going. Then the House (254-154) cut the President's $3.8 billion foreign-aid request to $3.1 billion.

The Administration's next best hope: restoration of principle and funds in a Senate-House conference compromise. Its next fear: What will happen when the appropriations themselves (and not just the authorizations) come up in the House and Senate?

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.