In the wake of President Carter’s rout in the national elections last night, some of Israel’s leading supporters among Democrats running for the House and Senate went down to defeat. Republicans, in control of the Senate for the first time in 26 years, are now slated to take over committee chairmanships. The Democrats apparently will retain control of the House.
Frank Church (D.Idaho), campaigning for his fifth term in the Senate, last to Republican Congressman Steven Symms and wish it the chairmanship of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee which he held since the defeat in 1974 of Sen. J. William Fulbright of Arkansas.
Church, a liberal fighting on uphill battle against the conservative Symms in a largely conservative state, trailed in the complete returns by 4442 votes out of a total of 439,789 cost, his office told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Symms, who spoke out for a unified Jerusalem under Israeli sovereignty in a House debate last June, was supported by conservative organizations while Church was opposed by the representative of the Palestine Liberation Organization Committee in New York. The some PLO organ also opposed Republican Sen. Robert Packwood of Oregon, but Packwood was reelected.
Democratic Rep. Clement Zablocki of Wisconsin and Republican Rep. William Broom field of Michigan were reelected and are expected to continue as chairman and ranking minority member respectively of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
CONSEQUENCES FOR SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE
In the Senate, however, the defeat of Church left in the air the future chairmanship of the Foreign Relations Committee and the chairmanship of its Middle East Subcommittee held by Sen. Richard Stone (D. Fla.) who was defeated in the Democratic primaries.
The defeats of Church, Stone and Sen. Jacob Javits, the New York Republican who was rejected in his party’s primaries and ran on the Liberal Party ticket, deprived the Foreign Relations Committee of its three leading supporters of U.S. assistance for Israel.
Republican Sen. Charles Percy of Illinois who ranked next to Javits in line for the committee chairmanship, was understood to be uncertain today whether to bid for that post or for chairmanship of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee in which he also is the senior Republican. Under party rules he cannot hold both chairmanships.
Percy’s office told the JTA that while the Senator has not made his decision, the committee as a whole would determine the chairmanship, and not necessarily on the basis of seniority.
An aide to Sea. Jesse Helms (R.NC), who is next to Percy in line for the Foreign Relations Committee chairmanship, told the JTA that Helms would not give any indication of whether he would seek the post until after Percy made his own decision known. It appears that Helms fully expects Percy to take the Foreign Relations post. Actually Sen. Howard Baker (R.Jenn.) precedes Helms in the Foreign Relations Committee ranking but Baker will take over as Senate Majority Leader from Sen. Robert Byrd (D.W.Va.). Had the Democrats not lost control of the Senate — the first time since President Eisenhower’s first administration — the Foreign Relations Committee chairmanship would have gone to Sen. Claiborne Pell of Rhode Island.
ANOTHER IMPORTANT CHANGE
Another important Senate change is the ascension of Sen. Mark Hatfield (R.Ore.) to the chairmanship of the Appropriations Committee next January as a result of the defeat of veteran Democratic Sen. Warren Magnuson of Washington.
Hatfield has often been critical of Israel. He has voted consistently against foreign aid in principle. In October 1979, he introduced an amendment to the foreign aid bill to reduce by 10 percent the $1 billion in military assistance to Israel to punish Israel for its alleged use of U.S. provided weapons in its attacks on Palestinian terrorist bases in Lebanon. The amendment failed.
The Appropriations Committee has a decisive voice in the amounts of U.S. foreign assistance. The Foreign Relations Committee determines the “authorization” of the funds in that it sets a ceiling on funding and the U.S. policy for its use. But the Appropriations Committee has the last word in committee action on the amount to be voted by the full Senate.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
