The New York Times / By ERIC SCHMITT AND JOSEPH KAHN
WASHINGTON, May 24 -- In a stunning victory for the Clinton administration and corporate America, the House today swept aside economic restrictions on China that were part of anti-Communist policy for two decades.
By a surprisingly wide margin, 237 to 197, lawmakers voted to give Beijing permanent normal trading privileges after months of fierce lobbying that pitted business against organized labor. A larger-than-expected Republican majority delivered President Clinton's top remaining legislative priority: three out of four Republicans voted in favor; two out of three Democrats voted against.
The vote virtually assures the end of the annual Congressional review of China's trade status, a ritual for 20 years that Beijing considers humiliating but that opponents argue is a lever for improving human rights. Congress has approved the trade status every year. The Senate is expected to endorse the permanent measure as early as next month, but may question some of the amendments the House added to the bill.
With his time in office winding down, Mr. Clinton threw the powers of the presidency behind passing the measure, which he considers a crowning foreign policy triumph. He met with more than 100 lawmakers face to face or in groups, called scores more by phone, and traveled to Congressional districts in the Midwest and California to rally support.
"The House of Representatives has taken an historic step toward continued prosperity in America, reform in China and peace in the world," Mr. Clinton said in a Rose Garden ceremony.
The agreement slashes Chinese tariffs on a wide range of farm and industrial products and removes some barriers to American service providers, like banks and telecommunications companies. And it puts the United States and China on equal footing as China enters the World Trade Organization, the 135-member trade group that sets the rules for global commerce.
Gov. George W. Bush of Texas, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee who has often voiced support for the legislation, hailed the vote. "Passage of this legislation will mean a stronger American economy, as well as more opportunity for liberty and freedom in China," Mr. Bush said in a statement.
Vice President Al Gore, who has walked a political tightrope between his labor allies and President Clinton, also voiced support for the bill today, but qualified it by saying that more had to be done to guarantee American workers' rights. "We must continue our efforts to assure that workers will succeed in a global economy," he said in a statement.
American companies and farmers -- from Internet moguls in Silicon Valley to orange growers in Florida -- supported normal trade ties with China so they could benefit fully from an accord that Washington and Beijing negotiated last November.
Regardless of the vote, China will enter the World Trade Organization. But without the blessing bestowed by Congress today, Beijing could withhold some trade benefits from the United States that it extends to other members of the group.
A coalition of labor unions, religious groups, environmentalists and veterans waged a furious campaign to deny Beijing this trade plum, arguing that it wrongly rewarded a Communist government that threatens its neighbors, represses its citizens and thumbs its nose at the rule of law. Unions have also voiced fears that passage would encourage American companies to move high-paying industrial jobs to China.
A frantic final round of lobbying, including horse-trading on home-district issues that have little to do with China, corralled enough undecided members yesterday to put the measure over the top. Late Tuesday, administration officials and Republican supporters of the bill said they were a handful of votes shy of the 218 needed for passage; opponents claimed the race was even at 210.
But when debate resumed this morning, opponents privately conceded defeat, and what had looked like a cliffhanger 24 hours earlier turned into a solid victory after four hours of largely pro forma debate.
Republicans attributed their wide support, which surprised even Representative Tom DeLay of Texas, the chief Republican vote counter, to several factors, including last Friday's agreement by Chinese and European negotiators on terms of China's entry into the trade organization and support for the bill by Taiwan's new president, Chen Shui-bian.
Several members of the Congressional Black Caucus followed the lead of an influential Democrat, Representative Charles B. Rangel of New York. Also, Representative Sander M. Levin, Democrat of Michigan, crafted an amendment to the bill with Republican Doug Bereuter of Nebraska to create a 23-member commission to monitor human rights in China, and a second proposal would help fight sudden surges of imports from China. Those provisions attracted about 20 lawmakers who might otherwise have opposed the measure, vote counters said.
Supporters said the agreement would open China's vast commercial market to American business. "For America, this agreement is a one-way street," said Representative Thomas M. Davis 3rd, a Virginia Republican. "Our markets are already open to China."
Over all, the United States bought $82 billion worth of China-made goods last year, $69 billion more than the value of what it sold to China. The trade deficit, America's second largest, was slightly smaller than the one with Japan.
Opponents criticized this measure as one that would undercut America's moral authority in the world.
"We must stand up for human rights and democracy throughout the world," said Representative John Lewis, Democrat of Georgia. "We have a chance to vote for the dignity of man and the destiny of democracy."
During the long run-up to the vote, President Clinton repeatedly argued that the measure was more about national security than economic gain. He argued that rejection of permanent trade ties would undercut China's reformers and remove the one firm pillar of bilateral relations, potentially leaving the world's leading democracy and the most populous country on a collision course.
But the real fight from the corridors of Congress to union halls and chambers of commerce nationwide cast the lobbying and advertising muscle of corporate America and farming groups against a fervent grass-roots coalition of organized labor, human rights groups, veterans organizations and religious leaders.
The United States Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable, two leading business groups, spent close to $10 million on ads -- their largest-ever campaign for a single legislative issue -- and assigned waves of lobbyists to buttonhole lawmakers.
Business leaders hailed the result as evidence that they could marshal support for a trade deal despite a string of defeats in the mid-1990's. Many had worried that after the collapse of world trade negotiations in Seattle late last year, the sentiment against globalization would make it difficult to get even the simplest and most economically beneficial trade measures through Congress.
But labor leaders denounced the vote. "This is a betrayal of workers' interests," said George Becker, president of the United Steelworkers of America. "This is about moving factories from the U.S. so that they can export back here."
Fuming about the Clinton administration's all-out pursuit of China trade, Mr. Becker said the Steelworkers' executive board would meet in three weeks to discuss its strategy in the upcoming elections.
On Tuesday, Mr. Clinton sought to begin patching up the rift the issue opened between the administration and labor by twice inviting John J. Sweeney, president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., to join him tonight at a big Democratic fund-raiser here. Mr. Sweeney declined, aides said, unwilling to sit among the corporate chieftains who championed the China bill.
"We mounted a forceful and nearly successful challenge to an array of money and forces unlike any before seen in a lobbying campaign," Mr. Sweeney said.
In the span of a month, Congress has now approved the China bill and legislation to expand trade ties with more than 70 nations in sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean.
Until now, the administration's last major trade victories were passage of the Uruguay Round in 1994, which created the World Trade Organization, and the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1993, which established duty-free commerce among the United States, Canada and Mexico.
Today's vote cut across party lines, as 164 Republicans and 73 Democrats voted in favor; 57 Republicans, 138 Democrats and 2 independents voted against. In the annual vote last year, 150 Republicans and 110 Democrats backed normal trade status for China. By comparison, the House passed Nafta in 1993 by 234 to 200, with 132 Republicans and 102 Democrats supporting the measure.
Like many lawmakers, John M. McHugh, a New York Republican, made his final decision on economic grounds after deliberating until the final hours. He said he had been barraged by supporters and opponents for weeks, especially by farmers urging him to back the bill and unions urging him to reject it. Dairy farms and a General Motors plant are among the two largest employers in his district, in the northern reaches of New York State.
"I decided that the gains from selling ice cream and cheese outweighed the potential for any job losses at G.M.," Mr. McHugh said. "It's not a magic elixir, but our dairy farms are really suffering, and they needed this."
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