Senate GOP Shelves Anti-Apartheid Bill : But House Votes Sanctions Against S. African Regime

The Senate Republican leadership, faced with a threatened filibuster by Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), today dropped efforts to press for immediate passage of a bill imposing economic sanctions against the government of South Africa in protest of its apartheid policy of racial separation.

But the House, controlled by Democrats, went ahead and approved the sanctions in a 380-48 vote.

Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole of Kansas said he will cut off the delaying tactic, but under parliamentary rules the bill now cannot be considered until after the Senate returns in September from a monthlong recess.

“We will vote after recess,” Dole told the Senate. Without mentioning Helms by name, he said, “I’ve been called by a senator who said eight senators are prepared to talk at length.”

With only hours left before the recess, Dole wanted to move the Senate on to other critical matters.

Outside the Senate chamber, Helms told reporters:

“All this bill does is exacerbate the situation in South Africa. Nobody is for apartheid, but who are we to be so pious about the efforts of the South African government to stop the riots, the looting, the shooting and the mayhem that’s going on over there?” he asked.

The sanctions, worked out by House and Senate negotiators, are a stinging rebuke of President Reagan’s policy of “constructive engagement”--the quiet pressuring of the regime to end apartheid.

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) said after a conference committee forged the bill Wednesday, “The Senate and House have stated the policy of constructive engagement is dead.”

The House surrendered to the Senate’s insistence against imposing an immediate ban on new investments by U.S. firms in South Africa. In exchange the Senate agreed that the gold Krugerrand may be banned immediately unless Reagan certifies that the country has made major progress in halting apartheid.

Threat of Veto

Hanging over the negotiators was the threat of a presidential veto. The Administration has opposed sanctions as counterproductive and harmful to South Africa’s black majority.

White House spokesman Larry Speakes said today that the Administration has “a number of complaints” about the bill and still believes that punitive measures “would hurt the black community in South Africa.”