Congress Passes Federal Funding With Contra Aid

The Democratic-controlled Congress, turning away from what has been a fixation on Central American policy during the Reagan era, on Friday approved a $27-million package of humanitarian aid for the Nicaraguan Resistance without uttering a single word of controversy.

The Contra aid package passed the House and Senate as Congress succeeded in funding the entire federal government before the beginning of the 1989 fiscal year at 12:01 a.m. (EST) today. It was the first time since 1977 that all 13 bills have been passed before the deadline.

It also was the first time since 1982, when the Administration’s program for assistance to the Nicaraguan Contras was just getting under way, that Congress has approved the aid without a bitter clash between Republicans and Democrats. The absence of controversy reflected a decision on the part of the Reagan Administration and GOP presidential nominee George Bush to soft-pedal the Contra aid issue before the election.

“It’s not a winner in an election year,” acknowledged Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.), a staunch advocate of Contra aid as well as a Bush supporter.

As a result of Bush’s decision, conservative Republicans in Congress decided several months ago that they would not put up a fight to obtain additional funds to provide the Contras with weapons and other military equipment. In response, liberal Democrats agreed not to oppose giving the Contras more money for food, clothing and shelter.

Although Republicans have tried repeatedly in past elections to use Reagan’s Central American policy as an issue against the Democrats, polls show that Americans are leery of giving aid--particularly military--to the Contras. Most Democrats either oppose Contra aid entirely or have strong reservations about military assistance.

Under the new legislation, the President would be permitted to seek congressional approval before the 100th Congress adjourns next week for releasing $16.5 million worth of previously purchased military goods that has never been given to the Contras. But Republicans said the White House has expressed no intention to exercise that option.

To win release of the military goods now, Reagan would have to satisfy Congress that he had consulted with Central American leaders about it. He would also have to certify that two of these three conditions currently exist in Nicaragua: that the Sandinista government has launched an unprovoked attack on the Contras, that the Sandinistas are blatantly violating the Central American peace accord or that the Soviet Union has continued to provide an “unacceptable” level of military aid to Nicaragua.

Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), chairman of the Senate subcommittee on Latin American policy and a Contra aid opponent, predicted that funding for the Nicaraguan Resistance will never again be at the center of the debate over Central American policy in the Congress. He noted that Democratic presidential nominee Michael S. Dukakis flatly opposes Contra aid and that Bush is not viewed to be as enthusiastic a supporter of the Contras as Reagan.

“In three months, the words Contra aid have never crossed his (Bush’s) lips--not even in the debate,” said Dodd, referring to the Bush-Dukakis debate last Sunday night.

Without a doubt, Contra aid has been the most divisive foreign policy issue in Congress during the Reagan era. After approving unfettered covert aid through the CIA in fiscal 1982, Congress put increasingly strict limitations on the funds until fiscal 1985, when the military aid was banned completely. Although military aid resumed briefly in the 1987 fiscal year, the Contras have received nothing but humanitarian assistance since the Iran-Contra scandal came to light.

The new Contra aid package was contained in a $282.9-billion defense spending measure, which passed the House by a vote of 327 to 77 and cleared the Senate by voice vote. Although Congress approved a defense spending package containing many of the same provisions earlier this week, no money could be spent by the Pentagon until an appropriations bill was also enacted.

The defense measure was the largest of the 13 appropriations bills that traditionally fund the government and was one of five such bills that were still working their way through Congress when the day began Friday. Six other appropriations bills already had been signed into law by the President, and two others have been sitting on Reagan’s desk since they cleared Congress earlier this week.

Congressional leaders had been anxious to virtually make history by passing all 13 bills and getting Reagan to sign them before the start of the new fiscal year. It has been four decades since the President has signed all of these bills before the deadline.

But even though Congress passed them at 11:57 p.m., there was not enough time to get them to the President before he retired for the night. Arriving back at the White House from a trip to Chicago at 10:45 p.m., Reagan, assuming lawmakers would fail, declared: “I had hoped that we would mark the end of the dog-ate-my-homework era of congressional budgetry, but it was not to be.”

In recent years, many of these appropriations bills have become so bogged down in controversy that Congress has been forced to fund the government at the last minute by passing a huge, catchall bill known as a continuing resolution. In some years, in fact, Congress has passed a series of these big bills throughout the year to keep the government running.

But Congress has received considerable criticism for passing these mammoth funding bills, which often are more than 1,000 pages long and frequently contain controversial items known only to a few members. And Reagan joined this chorus during his State of the Union speech last Jan. 25 when he dropped a copy of the last, one-foot-thick continuing resolution on the podium and declared that he would never again sign such a bill.

By Friday, the President had signed appropriations bills funding the Energy, Housing and Urban Development, Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, Treasury and Interior departments, the Postal Service and the independent agencies and the military construction budget of the Pentagon. In addition, Congress had approved--but Reagan had not signed--money bills for the Commerce, Justice, State and Transportation departments as well as the judiciary.

But still to be approved when Congress came to work on the final day of the 1988 fiscal year were bills funding the Pentagon, the Agriculture Department, the foreign operations budget of the State Department, the District of Columbia and Congress itself. Although the Agriculture Department measure breezed through, all of the others--including defense--ran into minor, last-minute snags.