Congress Nixes Reagan Civil Rights Veto

WASHINGTON--Congress overrode President Reagan's veto of a major civil rights bill yesterday, ending a four-year battle to restore broad protection for women, minorities, the elderly and the handicapped.

A 73-24 vote in the Senate, followed by a 292-133 tally in the House, handed Reagan a severe political defeat and reversed a 1984 Supreme Court decision that sharply restricted the reach of four antidiscrimination statutes.

The votes in both chambers exceeded the two-thirds majority needed to enact a law over a presidential veto. It was the ninth time Congress had rejected a Reagan veto.

The White House pledged to enforce the new law, which Reagan had called a federal "power grab."

"We presented an alternative civil rights act which stated the president's strong views against discrimination in this country," a White House statement said. "The Congress chose to override the president's veto. We will work to implement the new law."

"People who voluntarily take federal funds have an obligation to treat everybody else fairly," said Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), summing up the rationale of lawmakers who have been pressing for the Civil Rights Restoration Act since the high court ruling.

The court said only specific programs or activities receiving federal aid had to comply with four major civil rights laws.

The restoration act bars discrimination by institutions, government agencies and some corporations that receive any federal aid. That means if a college physics department, for example, receives federal assistance, the entire college would fall under the civil rights laws.

Reagan and his congressional allies argued for a less sweeping alternative, saying the act went far beyond simple restoration. They said it would curtail religious liberty and expand federal control over the private sector.

"It's a blank check to the bureaucrats and the litigators," said Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.).

But House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Texas) said in a statement that Reagan's veto was "wholly unnecessary and it provoked an unnecessary confrontation. The new law will not end illegal discrimination. But it does represent a step forward in making America truly a land of equal opportunity for all."

Supporters in the House erupted into cheers and applause when the two-thirds mark was reached. In the Senate, the mood was more subdued.

Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), the chief Senate sponsor of the measure, said the Senate had demonstrated that "this country does not want to retreat on protections of rights for the American people."

The opposition leader, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said: "Sometimes you win some, and sometimes you lose some. That's the nature of our process."

Ralph Neas, executive director of the 185-group Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, called the votes "a bipartisan reaffirmation of civil rights and a bipartisan repudiation of the civil rights extremism of the Reagan-Bush administration. It was a great victory for civil rights and for the nation."

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, however, said the bill "does little to protect these basic rights" and may end up "imposing unnecessary regulatory burdens" on businesses, farmers and others.

Opponents contended the bill had little to do with civil rights and had much to do with what Reagan yesterday called "a power grab by Washington, designed to take control away from states, localities, communities, parents and the private sector and give it to federal bureaucrats and judges."

Reagan had proposed an alternative last week that would enable more institutions to escape regulation on religious grounds and limit most corporate compliance requirements to specific plants or facilities receiving federal aid.

As they voted yesterday, many lawmakers, even some who voted to sustain Reagan's veto, denounced a last-minute campaign against the restoration act by the conservative Moral Majority.

They said they received hundreds of calls from people who said they had been told the bill would force them to hire homosexual ministers and teachers, give new privileges to drug addicts and intrude on their freedom to practice or contribute to their religions.