Falling Short

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The official Democratic response took the form of a pointed, closely reasoned address by Pennsylvania Congressman William Gray, chairman of the House Budget Committee, who branded the U.S. and Britain the "co-guarantors of apartheid." The President insisted that sanctions do not work, noted Gray, yet he has imposed them on some 20 nations throughout the world, including Poland and Libya, where they stood far less chance of being effective. Because sanctions are what Pretoria fears most, said Gray, they are the best bet for getting South Africa to act. "Without economic sanctions," he said, "without pressure, without increasing the cost of apartheid, there is no reason for South Africa to dismantle apartheid."

Gray agreed with the President that the nations surrounding South Africa might be hurt by sanctions, but he noted that they had issued a joint statement supporting sanctions "even if it means some hardship for their own nations and economies." Ultimately, Gray saw the President as having a moral double standard toward the oppressed: "The President has preached that the Reagan doctrine is to fight for freedom. Why is the doctrine being denied in Pretoria?" Other reaction on Capitol Hill ranged along a narrow spectrum from outrage to disappointment; virtually no one from either party came to the President's side. Democrats generally saw Reagan as the victim of moral myopia and of enlisting on the wrong side of history. Said Democratic Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa: "President Reagan abandoned any pretense of providing moral leadership."

What worried the White House more was the revolt among moderate Republicans, who saw the President as being out of step with Congress and perhaps the voters. Republican Senator Richard Lugar, a consistent ally of the President's and chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, had urged Reagan to propose a new tack. He was clearly discouraged by the result. "I think the President needs to do more," he said afterward. "I had hoped the President would take this occasion for an extraordinary message to the world." Republican Senator Nancy Kassebaum of Kansas, a respected voice on African policy, seemed to speak for many fellow Republicans. "I was deeply disappointed with the President's speech," she said. "It gave no new direction." The day after the speech, in what could be described as a ritual sacrifice, Shultz testified for four hours in a crowded Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing room. The Secretary went out of his way to suggest that the Administration was not inflexible in its opposition to sanctions and that he was interested in talking with the leaders of the ANC, which he called "an important part of the South African political equation." Despite this peace offering, he was excoriated by a succession of Democratic Senators, topped off by a histrionic display of outrage by Delaware Senator Joseph Biden.