Anti-Terrorism Pact Reached in Congress

As 9-month-old Kylie Williams, whose father died in the Oklahoma City bombing, offered a punctuating murmur, senior House and Senate members said Monday they had agreed on anti-terrorism legislation.

The measure would expand federal law enforcement authorities’ ability to tap telephone conversations by suspected terrorists and to mark some explosives that can be used in bombs. This procedure, called tagging, would make it easier to trace the bombs.

The measure would also speed up executions of death-row inmates.

President Clinton called for a stronger measure, but he was said to have indicated he would be inclined to sign the bill outlined Monday.

Motivated by the Oklahoma City bombing last April 19, lawmakers had vowed last spring to enact tough restrictions intended to combat terrorism in the United States.

But they quickly became bogged down by objections: Some Democrats complained the measure would too sharply curtail civil liberties; some Republicans said it would give too much power to the government.

After compromising on some differences and dropping other controversial provisions, the chairmen of the House and Senate Judiciary committees announced completion Monday of a $1-billion package that they said would gain sufficient support for passage by Friday, the first anniversary of the bombing in which 168 people were killed at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building.

Objections raised by the National Rifle Assn. to the tagging of fertilizers, which fueled the Oklahoma City bomb, and some other explosives reportedly kept use of the marking procedure for such materials out of the legislation.

Nor does the bill permit law enforcement officials to gain judicial approval of widespread tapping of cellular phones, a measure advocated by Atty. Gen. Janet Reno.

Some two dozen survivors of the Oklahoma City bombing and relatives of its casualties joined Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) and House Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry J. Hyde (R-Ill.) for the announcement of the accord on the bill and called on other members of Congress to support it.

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“Make a stand for justice,” said Diane Leonard, who struggled with her emotions as she read her brief statement. Her husband, Don, a Secret Service agent for 24 years, was killed in the bombing.

The far-reaching revision of death-penalty appeals would impose new limits on federal judicial review of state capital punishment cases. It would give prisoners no more than one year after state court appeals have been exhausted to file federal appeals, which would be restricted in content; executions would be completed within two years of final state court action.

Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, said in a written statement that the measure would “stop the seemingly endless delays and frivolous appeals by convicted death-row inmates.”

As recently as Saturday, the president called for legislation that would prevent terrorist groups from raising money in the United States and would allow the government to quickly deport foreigners who supported terrorist activities. He also called for permission to use sophisticated surveillance techniques and tagging of explosives. To one degree or another, the legislation contains such provisions.

He had objected to the new limits on death-row appeals, but Hatch said that in a telephone conversation Sunday evening, Clinton said he would not veto the bill over that provision.

Hatch said the bill “adds important tools to the government’s fight against terrorism, and does so in a temperate manner that is protective of civil liberties.”

But the American Civil Liberties Union complained that the measure would allow the use of secret evidence in deportation hearings; designate certain groups as “terrorist” organizations, thus barring their members from visiting the United States and keeping Americans from supporting their activities, and allow summary deportation of refugees who are seeking political asylum but who have arrived here without proper documentation.

The legislation, said Laura W. Murphy, director of the organization’s national office here, “would tear at the fabric of our society and make us no safer, just less free.”