Votes on Taxes, Abortion Put Key Issues in Spotlight

WASHINGTON -- With lawmakers keen to highlight political differences rather than cut legislative deals, the House voted Friday to expand retirement-account tax breaks while the Senate voted to support abortion rights for women in the U.S. military.

Neither measure is given much chance of becoming law this year. But as is often the case with issues such as abortion and taxes--and with fall elections approaching--lawmaking isn’t necessarily the point.

“This is red meat for the true believers,” said Marshall Wittmann, a congressional analyst at the Hudson Institute, a conservative think tank. “These are important votes to constituencies that both parties need to turn out in November.”

The bill the House passed was the latest in a series of tax-cutting measures pushed through the chamber by the Republican majority. But major tax legislation has gone nowhere this year in the Democratic-led Senate, and no breakthrough appears imminent.

Last week, for example, the Senate rejected an effort to extend a repeal of the estate tax--a vote that appeared to bury the chances that any further significant tax legislation will be enacted by the 107th Congress.

Still, on a 308-70 vote, the House on Friday approved a bill sponsored by Reps. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Benjamin L. Cardin (D-Md.) that would make permanent provisions in last year’s tax cut related to retirement savings.

Under the $1.35-trillion, 10-year tax cut enacted at President Bush’s urging, Congress gradually raised the amount of money taxpayers can contribute to tax-favored retirement accounts.

For instance, the limit on transfers to individual retirement accounts will rise in steps, from $3,000 currently to $5,000 a year by 2008. And the annual limit on tax-deferred contributions to employer-sponsored 401(k) and similar savings plans will rise from the current $11,000 to $15,000 by 2006.

Those and other retirement-related tax breaks, like the rest of the sweeping tax cut law, are scheduled to expire on Dec. 31, 2010. As a result, tax rules and rates in effect in 2001 will resume in 2011. For instance, annual contributions to IRAs will revert to $2,000.

That was the result of a political compromise that enabled Bush and his GOP allies to bypass Senate obstacles last year on their way to winning approval of the largest tax cut in a generation. But since the law took effect, the federal budget has plunged back into recession. For these reasons and others, Democrats have argued that making key parts of the tax cut permanent would be irresponsible. But House Republican leaders have forged ahead, positioning their party as an advocate for more tax relief.

“This is the sixth bill that House Republicans have passed this year to provide Americans permanent tax relief, and one more chance for the Senate to do the right thing,” said House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas).

In the vote, 115 Democrats joined 192 Republicans and one independent to approve the bill. No Republicans were opposed.

But House Democratic leaders also sought to score political points by forcing a vote on an alternative measure that would crack down on corporations and executives that seek to take advantage of overseas tax shelters. Republicans provided most of the votes to defeat the measure, 204 to 182, but House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) claimed his party was on the right side of an increasingly prominent issue: corporate accountability.

“By their continued opposition to strong, sensible steps and by their continued allegiance to multimillion-dollar corporate special interests, the Republican majority is guilty of enabling corporate excesses that have done such harm,” Gephardt said.

In the Senate, Democrats spotlighted the issue of abortion rights during debate on a $393-billion defense authorization bill. The amendment, sponsored by Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), would allow women who serve in the U.S. military to obtain privately funded abortions at military installations overseas.

Currently, those women who want an abortion must get approval from a commanding officer to return to the United States for the procedure--or must seek to have it in a nonmilitary facility in the host country.

Five Republicans--Sens. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, Ted Stevens of Alaska and Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine--joined 46 Democrats and one independent in approving the amendment. California’s two Democratic senators, Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, both voted for it.

The House has already rejected a similar amendment, however, and the Bush administration does not support it. That makes enactment highly unlikely.

But the senators who voted for the measure got an immediate payoff from abortion-rights supporters. Gloria Feldt, president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, hailed the Senate for taking “a key step towards protecting the health and rights of those servicewomen overseas who protect our freedom.”

To be sure, Friday’s votes may ultimately serve more than election-year purposes. Frequently, passage of major legislation requires many roll calls over several years in Congress. But with control of the narrowly divided House and Senate at stake in the fall elections, many more votes in the coming weeks are destined to become political fodder.

On Wednesday, for instance, the House expects to take up a bill to help provide prescription drug coverage for the elderly. The bill was approved Friday by the House Energy and Commerce Committee and sent on to the full House. Although the Senate is likely to approve its own version of that bill, lawmakers are showing little sign that they are ready to cut a bipartisan deal to get the legislation to the president.