Senate OKs U.N. Funds Bill, but It Faces Veto

In a test of wills between President Clinton and the Republican Congress that threatens to undercut U.S. leadership at the United Nations, lawmakers passed legislation Tuesday that almost certainly dooms Washington’s effort to pay its back dues to the world organization.

The Senate passed and sent to the White House a bill that contains almost $1 billion to start paying Washington’s overdue U.N. assessments. But the legislation includes an unrelated antiabortion provision, attached by House Republicans, that Clinton opposes. He immediately announced that he will veto the measure.

Senate Republican leaders said if the bill is vetoed, Congress will not schedule another vote on the matter this year. Under U.N. rules, if the United States does not reduce its debt by the end of this year, Washington will be vulnerable to losing its vote in the General Assembly. The dues have been only partially paid since the Reagan administration.

Although some Senate Republicans are openly skeptical of the U.N.’s value, both sides agreed Tuesday that it is important for the U.S. to start paying the assessments. But unless the Republicans or the Clinton administration backs down, the issue is dead for this year.

Speaking at a Rose Garden ceremony, Clinton heaped scorn on the Republicans, accusing them of telling the world that “different rules apply to us, and we have a right not to pay our way. . . . I don’t think that is a responsible, mature message to send to the world by the leading country in the world.”

But Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Clinton “has waved that veto flag time after time. But he should realize that this is it. If he vetoes this bill, there will be no further action.” Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) agreed: “This is it. Everybody needs to understand that.”

The measure the Senate approved and sent to the White House was drafted by a Senate-House conference committee after the two chambers approved slightly different versions last year. The House approved it earlier. Under congressional rules, the final conference committee bill cannot be amended at this stage of the legislative process.

The measure was approved 51 to 49, as all but two of the 45 Senate Democrats, joined by six Republicans, voted against the bill in an effort to send it back to the conference committee. California Democratic Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer voted no.

Besides addressing U.N. dues, the bill reorganizes U.S. foreign policy agencies, a measure proposed by Helms. The administration first opposed the effort but then embraced it.

But from the White House point of view, the poison pill is a provision barring U.S. aid to private groups that lobby governments to change their policies on abortion--even if no U.S. money is used for the lobbying. Although existing legislation prohibits use of U.S. funds for any activity promoting abortion, private groups are permitted to use money obtained from other sources for lobbying in other countries.

Administration officials call the provision an unacceptable “gag rule” on overseas private groups. They accuse Republican abortion foes of “legislative blackmail” for including the abortion provision.

But Republicans insist that Clinton could easily win approval for the U.N. dues money and other elements of the bill important to him by agreeing to the antiabortion provision.

“If Clinton vetoes it, we will redirect all complaints from the U.N. to the White House,” said Marc Thiessen, a spokesman for Helms. “Apparently, the administration is prepared to sacrifice its top foreign policy priority to a small group of abortion advocates.”

Although U.N. rules say the U.S. could lose its General Assembly vote over its arrears, it seems unlikely the world body would go that far. The U.N. has overlooked back dues by major countries. For instance, it let the old Soviet Union keep its vote despite a dues boycott it waged early in the Cold War.

Republicans were unimpressed by the possibility that the U.N. might take away Washington’s vote. “Make our day,” Thiessen said. The U.N., he added, “seems to be in a self-destruct mode.”

If Clinton vetoes the bill and the Republicans refuse to take up the matter again, the antiabortion measure will die along with the U.N. and State Department reorganizations. Some House Republicans who originally inserted the antiabortion provision have suggested that they might tack it onto another administration foreign policy priority--an $18-billion increase in U.S. funding for the International Monetary Fund.

Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), floor manager for the administration on the legislation, said in a telephone interview that if the GOP takes on the IMF bill, “that seems . . . to sound the note for what the next eight months will be”--a legislative gridlock on major foreign policy measures.