Nation: Sanctions Stay

• Share

But the Senate battles Carter on Zimbabwe-Rhodesia

For Jimmy Carter, as for any politician, it is a happy issue that combines both moral principle and political calculation. The President believes the elections that installed a black majority government in Zimbabwe-Rhodesia could not be called "either fair or free," largely because they were held under a constitution that reserves a disproportionate share of power for the white minority. Carter thus had a moral reason when he decided not to lift the economic sanctions that prevent the U.S. from buying Rhodesian chrome. Politically, moreover, the maintaining of sanctions puts the U.S. on the side of black Africa, and, as a bonus, scores points with American blacks who feel that Carter has been ignoring them. The President's judgment on that score was confirmed only two hours after he announced the decision to continue sanctions. He mingled with 800 black musicians and their friends on the White House lawn, and for the first time in months was surrounded by applauding blacks.

But nothing comes easy for Carter these days, not even making his decision stick on a secondary issue of foreign policy that Congress in happier times would have been content to leave to the President. Last week the Senate voted 52-41 in favor of a measure sponsored by Virginia's Harry Byrd to lift the sanctions. South Carolina Republican Strom Thurmond caught the mood of the Senate's conservatives when he thundered that the guerrilla movements "are armed and guided by the Soviet Union, China, Cuba and other Communist states. We must not give aid or comfort to guerrillas who would overthrow a democratic government and install a Marxist government."

Moreover, the Senate tacked that demand onto a $40 billion weapons-procurement bill, making it more difficult for Carter to veto the package. Nonetheless, Secretary of State Cyrus Vance warned emphatically that the President would kill the measure, and White House aides were quick to point out that the 41 votes for the President's position were seven more than needed to sustain a veto.

In fact, Congress is unlikely to push the issue that far. The Administration's position has more support in the House, which will soon vote on a bill to let the President continue sanctions until he has determined that genuine majority rule exists in Zimbabwe-Rhodesia. The measure has a good chance of passage. Even if that proposal is defeated, the House Armed Services Committee has proposed a weapons-procurement bill that says nothing about sanctions. Odds are that a HouseSenate conference called to reconcile the two versions of the arms bill would drop the Senate's rider, rather than force Carter into a veto that could not be overridden, and that would oblige Congress to pass the vital weapons bill a second time.

For all that, the question of how long the U.S. will maintain sanctions remains open, and Carter left himself a conspicuous out: he promised to watch the Zimbabwe-Rhodesia government's "progress toward . . . more legitimate and genuine majority rule," send a U.S. diplomat to Salisbury to monitor that effort and consult monthly with Congress on the issue.