REAGAN'S STRENGTH IN U.S. CONGRESS APPEARS SAPPED
President Reagan's reduced strength
in Congress has been demonstrated by the U.S. Senate's decision
to approve a highway spending bill despite his attempts to veto
it, political analysts said.
    "He's very weakened," said William Schneider of the private
American Enterprise public policy group after the Senate voted
67-33 yesterday to ignore Reagan's veto of the road bill.
    Schneider contrasted Reagan's failure with his previous
ability to win clear majorities on major issues.
    Sustaining his veto required him to win just one-third of
the votes in either house of Congress.
    It was the third consecutive fight over a presidential veto
on which Congress had defied Reagan, whose clout with the
legislature has been greatly diminished by the arms-for-Iran
scandal and the capture of a majority in the Senate by the
opposition Democratic party in the November 1986 election.
    Congress overrode Reagan's veto of a popular water projects
bill in January and last autumn Congress rejected his veto of
economic sanctions against South Africa.
    But this time the president laid his full authority on the
line, even making a rare journey to Capitol Hill to plead for
support in person.
    With both the House and Senate in Democratic hands,
analysts say Reagan is swiftly becoming a lame duck, facing
difficulties in enacting his own legislative agenda, especially
given the furore over the Iran arms deal.
    The situation contrasts with Reagan's first six years in
office when a Republican-controlled Senate and the backing of
conservative Democrats in the House enabled Reagan to win
passage of most of his legislative priorities.
    Reagan's ability to veto legislation he dislikes had been
his strongest weapon in dealing with Congress, but his defeat
on the highway bill was expected to reduce the credibility of
his veto power.
    Senator John Chafee, a Rhode Island Republican, told the
New York Times earlier this week that if Reagan lost "there will
be no brake on -- if you suggest a presidential veto you will
be laughed away."
    Yesterday's defeat came two days after the House of
Representatives' overwhelming rejection of a presidential veto
on the highways bill by 350 votes to 73.
    White House strategists had presented the veto fight as a
test of Reagan's strength as he attempted to recover from the
scandal over secret arms sales to Iran.
    Senate Republican leader Robert Dole of Kansas pleaded with
fellow party members to back Reagan because "this may determine
the strength of the presidency for the next 21 months."
    The defeat showed the problems facing any president in his
final years in office. Reagan's term expires in January 1989.
    A majority of Republicans in the House of Representatives
and 13 in the Senate apparently decided their own political
concerns have become more important than the president's.
    "President Reagan, he ain't going to be running in 1988, but
I am," Congressman Arthur Ravenel, a South Carolina Republican,
said on Tuesday of his decision to back a bill that means money
and jobs for his home district in new highway construction.
    The defeat interrupted a good streak for Reagan, who won
applause for his selection in February of former Senate
majority leader Howard Baker to replace Donald Regan as White
House chief of staff, and was believed by most political
analysts to have benefitted from a televised speech and a news
conference on the Iran affair last month.
    A steady drop in Reagan's job approval ratings appeared to
level off in recent weeks. The president slumped from about 65
pct last autumn to about 42 pct after the Tower Commission
report in February said he had failed to exercise proper
control over the dealings with Iran.
    His approval rating hovers at 50 pct.
    Reagan said he was deeply disappointed by the Senate defeat
but "my efforts to control spending are not diminished."
    Democratic leader Robert Byrd said "this isn't going to make
or break the president."
 REUTER
