Congressional Report:

Senate Moves Toward Rejection of Treaty

The Senate moved steadily toward a vote rejecting the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty late October 13, after supporters of the arms control pact -- knowing they lacked the votes for ratification -- failed in a last-ditch attempt to keep the issue off the floor.

Behind-the-scenes efforts by leading Democrats and Republicans to forge a compromise under which Senate consideration would be deferred, most likely until 2001, fell apart earlier in the day. Even some opponents of the treaty as written, like Republican Senator John Warner of Virginia, had fought to avoid a substantive vote because of the message that outright rejection could send to other nations.

But by late afternoon the Senate, which had suspended consideration of the treaty in order to pass a farm spending bill, formally voted to return to the CTBT issue. By then the vote was along straight party lines, 55-45, to proceed.

Approval of a treaty takes 67 favorable votes in the 100-member body -- a total that all sides agreed could not be attained in this case.

During a final debate leading up to the expected vote, Republican Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina called the CBTB the most egregious arms control treaty ever presented to the Senate -- one which could not be verified or enforced. Democrat Barbara Boxer of California countered by warning that a U.S. rejection would inevitably set an example for others, and could prompt a "nuclear chain reaction" overseas.

President Clinton signed the CTBT in 1996, the first national leader to do so. A total of 154 countries have now signed it, but only 26 of the 44 countries with a nuclear capability have ratified.