78. Although the resolution is presently being held in committee, 190 Members--only 24 short of the necessary majority--have signed a discharge petition to bring the resolution to the House Floor for a debate. Finally, it should be pointed out that the House has acted three times in the past month in a manner that can only be interpreted as hostile to swift passage of the implementing legislation should the President take actions to ratify or initiate ratification of the treaties. On May 9, under the leadership of Mr. Hansen, the House added an amendment to the first concurrent Budget legislation to prohibit the use of any funds to be used to implement the Canal treaties. On May 24th, also under the leadership of Mr. Hansen, a similar amendment was added to the Defense authorization bill. On May 31, Mr. Hansen once again was successful, by a vote of 203 to 163, in adding the amendment to the Foreign Relations Assistance Authorization bill. The fear that the President might be tempted to put Congress under the gun was the motivating force behind the Brooke reservation. The effect of the Brooke amendment was to prevent the ratification of the treaties before March 31, 1979, unless the implementing legislation were enacted earlier. In other words, the President could not start the clock running for nearly a year; but once he did so, Congress would still be under the gun, Yet the Brooke amendment still gives Congress only about 17 months to act, about half as much time as was taken in 1955. 79. And there is no guarantee that Congress will act, given the attitude of the House. A prudent President would not ratify the treaties at all until it was clear that Congress had acted or until all the difficulties had been satisfied. The Brooke amendment is supposed to guarantee at least 17 months for action, but if the President should ratify at the earliest possible date (March 31, 1979), Congress might still not be able to complete the legislation successfully. The literal effect of the Brooke amendment was to guarantee some time for the Congress to act; but the intended effect was to warn the President of rash and preciptate action. The intent was to warn the President that March 31, 1979 was the earliest possible date, and that if he were wise, he might wait until much later. Unfortunately, the Brooke reservation contains one ambiguous word, "effective," speaking of the effective date of the exchange of instruments of ratification. By an extraordinary interpretation of this word, Administration officials have announced that the President is about to take precipitate action: an immediate exchange of the instruments of ratification, with the "effective" date of March 1979. This was described as making the exchange "in escrow. If the President actually takes such a step, he will be setting the clock moving on the 17 month period--an action that could well lead to international and Constitutional confrontation. 31, 80. 1. THE INTENT OF CONGRESS IN PASSING THE BROOKE RESERVATION Senator Brooke, in presenting his amendment on the Floor, very carefully spelled out his intent. He was very specific in describing the nature of the timetable it set up: "The reservation as I am not submitting it provides the following timetable: "First, the exchange of ratification shall not be effective earlier than March 31, 1979. It need not take place even at that date." took Thus, the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts "Second, the treaties shall not enter into force Thus, once more, the Senator emphasized that March 31 and October 1, 1979, were "the earliest dates." He went on to explain the complexity of the problem and the need to use caution: "It would provide us an opportunity to monitor the "A relatively long time period between the decision to ratify, if it is made, and the effective date of the treaties is needed for several reasons. First, if the implementing legislation is needed, it will be extremely complex. Numerous statutes will be affected. All legal ramifications of the end to U.S. jurisdiction in an area we have controlled for three-quarters of a century will have to be explored. A new employment system will have to be established. 81. In short, the passage of the Panama Canal Treaty of 1977 "Second, any reasonable assessment of the legislative schedule for the rest of this year leads to the conclusion that it would be impossible to give the necessary in-depth attention to the implementing legislation it deserves this year. There is a backlog of important legislation on energy, farm problems, labor relations, and so forth.... "Third, the implementing legislation would be of interest to many committees. This will inevitably add to the time necessary to consider it in an adequate manner. "Fourth, this is an election year. The necessity of campaigning will further restrict the capacity of Members to give the needed attention to this matter. "Fifth, there are likely to be many controversies between Congress and the executive regarding this legislation. For instance, it appears that the administration, in many of its calculations regarding the financial arrangements envisioned in the treaty, has assumed that the United States will forgo the interest payments on the U.S. investment that are presently going to the Treasury from canal revenues. I believe Congress would and should insist that those payments continue.... "There is, thus, ample reason to prolong the period before the treaties go into effect." Senator Brooke, therefore, put the Executive Branch on notice that he did not expect ratification to take place until the President had time to review events in Panama and the Con gress had time to act. He made it perfectly clear that the President was not required or expected to act by March 31, 1979. He outlined the difficulties facing the implementing legislation, and, finally, he pointed out the constitutional crisis that would be involved if the President acted precipitously: "There is an additional important reason why sufficient time should be allowed to pass the implementing legis 82. lation. If the treaty came into effect before the United The intent of the Brooke reservation, therefore, was to give time to allow prudence, caution, moderation, and discretion in the timing of the instruments of ratification. It was not expected that the President would take hasty action which might foreclose a decision not to ratify later on, and which would eliminate any leverage that the President might have in in the post-treaty negotiations that the United States might have with Panama over implementation. Yet the State Department has announced that it intends for the President to exchange the instruments of ratification immediately, with the effective date to be March 31, 1979. The theory that the instruments be exchanged "in escrow" means that the power of pulling back or delaying the entry into force will be removed from United States control. It means that the United States will be committed to a specific date even before the President can be sure that Congress will have completed its work in time. The proposed exchange of instruments "in escrow" is like delivering over a post-dated check to a creditor. |