How the Treaty Was Saved

"We are in the ninth inning"

The first Panama Canal treaty turned on a handful of votes, and so it seemed would the second as the critical vote loomed last week. South Dakota Democrat James Abourezk, for example, was miffed at being cut out of White House-Congress meetings trying to resolve the question of deregulating natural gas prices. California Republican Sam Hayakawa had fired off a letter to Carter complaining about a wide variety of Administration foreign policy moves. Nevada Democrat Howard Cannon wanted to tack onto the Panama treaty a relatively minor reservation. Massachusetts Republican Edward Brooke was pushing some technical changes. All were threatening to cast negative votes.

But as the Democratic leadership and the White House eyed those potentially fatal reversals of votes that had been cast for the first treaty last month, an equally damaging and more substantive division arose. Half a dozen Democratic Senators--notably Edward Kennedy, George McGovern and Patrick Moynihan--agreed with Panama's protest against a reservation added to the first treaty by Arizona Democrat Dennis DeConcini, which seemed to imply that the U.S. was free to intervene militarily in Panamanian affairs whenever it chose. They warned that they would vote against the treaty unless a "noninterventionist" clarification was added. But DeConcini and several allies were just as insistent that his reservation not be repudiated.

If the treaty was to pass, it had to include some new reservation that could appease both factions. Tougher yet, it must also satisfy Panama's unpredictable chief of state, Omar Torrijos. The General telephoned his ambassador in Washington, Gabriel Lewis, and told him: "Gabriel, we are in the ninth inning. There are two outs and two strikes. See what you can do."

Lewis turned to an old friend, William Rogers, 50, a lawyer and former State Department official who had served as President Kennedy's expert on Latin America. Rogers flew to Panama, where Torrijos told him that Panama would not accept the DeConcini reservation, and some new "statement of political and legal dignity" must be added to the second treaty. Rogers offered himself as an intermediary.

He arranged a secret meeting at Ambassador Lewis' Florida hideaway, near Kendale Lakes. There the ambassador and other Torrijos aides explained the minimum conditions they would require of the Senate for acceptance of the treaties. The role of Rogers meshed with the needs of the prime treaty strategists in the Senate, including Democratic Leader Robert Byrd, Republican Leader Howard Baker, Democratic Whip Alan Cranston and the treaty floor manager, Frank Church, who wanted firsthand information on Panamanian feelings.

Yet it was Deputy Secretary of State Warren Christopher who put together another secret meeting, this time on the Sunday before the vote. Both sides met again in Church's obscure but comfortable private room off a corridor in the Capitol. Lewis arrived with an aide and a quip: "I go to Church on Sunday, like every good Christian." But in a two-hour showdown, the talk turned serious as the ambassador, Rogers and the Senators struggled to compose a reservation acceptable to all parties. Byrd crouched on his knees, honing a draft over a coffee table. Lewis chomped on ice cubes.

The ebullient Lewis talked for 40 minutes, explaining the political situation in Panama and the need for some concession on U.S. intervention. Finally Byrd interrupted him. "We're your friends," the Senator said. "We've been supporting the treaty. You've got to listen to us. What we are telling you is what the situation is in the Senate."

As the group continued refining the reservation, making clear that the U.S. would not interfere in the "political independence" or "internal affairs" of Panama, Lewis kept pressing for further restrictions. "That won't fly," he was repeatedly told. Lewis held out for one last change, that the treaties not "be interpreted as a right" of intervention by the U.S. The Senators took Christopher into a corner for a whispered consultation. He thought the addition would be helpful. "Okay," Byrd told Lewis. "We'll try it." But, he declared grimly, "no more changes. Don't come back here with more problems."

Lewis asked for five hours to clear the final language with Torrijos. That night he telephoned Christopher at Camp David, where Carter was also shown the final language. Christopher called Byrd with Torrijos' reaction: "It is a dignified solution to a difficult problem."

But if Panama was now appeased, Byrd's problems with other Senators remained. DeConcini wanted more time to study the final wording. The freshman Senator, catapulted into prominence by his role as decision maker, finally phoned Byrd in the afternoon. "I can live with this," he said. So could the group of liberal Democrats.

Byrd asked the President to work on Abourezk and Hayakawa. Carter telephoned them both, inviting the 71-year-old Californian ex-professor to the White House. There Carter and Zbigniew Brzezinski, the National Security Adviser, briefed Hayakawa for more than half an hour on policy toward Rhodesia--an unrelated issue that the Senator had emphasized in his critical letter. As Hayakawa was leaving, Carter pleaded, in typical low-pressure style: "I hope you can find it possible to support the treaty." Replied Hayakawa: "I'm leaving all options open." Byrd and Baker pleaded with Hayakawa too. So did at least eight of his Senate colleagues. But he remained noncommittal. Brooke, however, was won over when the leadership accepted his reservations.

Byrd now felt that the problem had been reduced to three reluctant Senators: Abourezk, Hayakawa and Cannon. If two of the three voted no, the second treaty was lost. He telephoned Carter on Monday night. "You've got three fires burning here," Byrd warned. Carter called all three Senators once more. None said which way he would vote.

Byrd spent a restless and despondent Monday night, fearing that all his work and personal political risk would end in a defeat on Tuesday. He felt only a shade better after sitting through yet another meeting, called by Baker, with Hayakawa. "Let me think about it further," was all Hayakawa would say. Byrd's spirits rose as he and Cannon agreed on a modification of the Nevadan's reservation. Cannon seemed content. That implied an unspoken commitment.

But Abourezk was tough to pin down. The South Dakotan told the President that if Carter would agree to veto any bill deregulating natural gas, he would vote for the treaty. Carter refused to get involved in that kind of political deal. Byrd talked at length with Abourezk, but made no headway. Then a bunch of Abourezk's colleagues went to work on the South Dakotan, arguing that he would look silly if the treaties lost because of his vote, and he tried to explain that he actually favored them but wanted to score points for his fight against deregulation of gas.

As the tense roll call began at 6:01 p.m. on Tuesday, the outcome was still in doubt. The very first name called was Abourezk. The responding voice said "Aye." In a second-row-center seat, Byrd showed no emotion. He did not answer when his own turn came. Cannon's vote was also aye. So too was Hayakawa's. At the climactic moment, Byrd jumped to his feet to cast the 67th--and decisive--aye vote. Arriving late, New Jersey Republican Clifford Case added an extra vote for ratification, resulting in precisely the same 68-to-32 tally by which the first treaty had been approved. Despite all the close calls and agonizing, not a single Senator had switched. Following the televised count in the office of his secretary, Susan Clough, Jimmy Carter shook hands with Brzezinski, gave his secretary a kiss and picked up a phone to congratulate Byrd. "You're a great man," he told the Senate leader. "It was a beautiful vote." The President then faced White House correspondents to declare that "this is a day of which Americans can feel proud--we have reminded the world and ourselves of the things that we stand for as a nation."

In Panama, where violent demonstrations had been feared in case of a Senate rejection, there was sporadic cheering and dancing in the streets, promoted by the government with handouts of free liquor. But Torrijos was less than gracious in victory. Finally venting his bitterness at many of the insults thrown his way during the long Senate debate, he told interviewers that if the Senate had rejected the treaty, his troops would have put the canal out of operation. His national guard, he said, "is capable of destroying it." And if the U.S. ever intervenes in Panama, he vowed, "they will find the canal destroyed."

Such talk will not speed the job of putting the treaties into effect. Both chambers of Congress must still pass legislation providing for appropriations and the mechanism for the transfer of authority. Weary of the subject, the legislators are not apt to act swiftly, but they face one clever reservation attached by Brooke. Even if Congress does not act sooner, the treaties will automatically go into effect Oct. 1, 1979. Long before then, President Carter is expected to go to Panama for the formal ratification signing with General Torrijos. It has been a long, unpopular struggle for two such different leaders seeking to build better relations between two vastly different nations.

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