Helms Plays a Petty Game

Four months ago President Reagan sent to the Senate his nomination of Winston Lord as ambassador to China. After a politically forced delay, the Foreign Relations Committee was finally able five weeks ago to approve the nomination on a 16-1 vote. But the full Senate still hasn’t been allowed to give its requisite consent. Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), the lone dissenter in the committee vote, has blocked floor action by threatening a filibuster if the Lord nomination is taken up. Senate leaders, with an abundance of other problems, shy away from that risk.

The issue agitating Helms is abortion. Earlier this year Reagan signed into law a ban on U.S. aid to “any organization that supports or participates in the management of a program of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization.” Helms claims that the U.S. contribution of $36 million to the U.N. Fund for Population Activities violates this law because the fund channels some aid to China, where coercive abortions have allegedly occurred.

Not so, the Administration responds. The U.N. agency that the United States supports does not itself engage in any coercive programs, and so the law is being observed. But Helms is adamant. As his price for allowing the Lord nomination to be voted on, he insists that the President write a letter promising to obey the law. Such a letter would, of course, implicitly suggest that up to now the President hasn’t been obeying the law. The White House so far has stood firm against this humiliating demand.

Put to a vote, there is no doubt that the Lord nomination would sail through the Senate. But the blackmail of a threatened filibuster is preventing that vote, and so the United States is being denied the experienced and able representation that it should have in Peking. This is not the first time that Helms has played the petty tyrant to get his way. His forte is the politics of coercion, and he sticks to that game no matter what the detriment to his country’s foreign relations.