Senate Oks Stopgap Spending Bill Clinton Signs Measure To Keep Government Open 7 More Weeks

The Senate on Friday passed and President Clinton signed stopgap spending legislation to keep the government open for another seven weeks, at reduced spending levels.

“There’s no question now of the government shutting down,” Clinton said in a speech and added later in a White House statement that Congress had passed only the stopgap legislation instead of spending bills for the rest of the year.

Efforts by Democrats to add amendments increasing spending for education and raising the limit on the national debt were defeated, but only after Republicans warned that any changes in the bill passed by the House on Thursday would delay enactment and force another government shutdown at midnight.

After those warnings, the Senate passed the bill, 82-8. Forty-three Republicans and 39 Democrats voted for it, while 2 Republicans and 6 Democrats were opposed.

Sen. Mark Hatfield, R-Ore., chairman of the Appropriations Committee, said, “We are literally here today with a gun to our heads,” because the House was in recess and not available to consider any changes the Senate might offer. “I detest this,” he said.

Democrats complained even more. “I am tired of legislative blackmail,” said Sen. John Glenn of Ohio. “We have been jerked around too many times here.”

Glenn complained that Senate leaders repeatedly said, “Next time we are going to be tough.” He said, “If there are changes we want to make, I think we ought to make them.”

The temporary spending bill was needed to avert a third partial government shutdown. Much of the government is without its regular appropriations because Clinton has vetoed 3 of 13 ordinary spending bills and Congress had failed to pass three others. The stopgap bill, which would keep the government operating until March 15, cuts many programs, some by as much as 25 percent below last year’s level.

Clinton announced he had signed the bill after finishing a speech to the Association of Hispanic Publications at the National Press Club Building.

Later, in the White House statement, he said: “I am pleased that the Congress avoided another partial government shutdown, and I appreciate its bipartisan approach toward this bill. Nevertheless, I regret that the Congress has not sent me acceptable 1996 appropriations bills for agencies that received funding only through March 15.”