If, as Lincoln said, a house divided against itself cannot stand, the House of Representatives seemed close to collapse on Wednesday over the North American Free Trade Agreement.
All day long, Democrats fought Democrats, Republicans fought Republicans and liberals and conservatives who had never before agreed on anything found themselves on the same side.
The rhetorical battle capped months of controversy that had similarly split the nation and fractured its political parties. But in the end, a minority of 102 House Democrats forged an unlikely alliance with a majority of 132 Republicans, and passed the agreement 234-200.
“We find our parties divided, not one against the other but internally divided,” House Speaker Tom Foley (D-Wash.) told a packed and hushed chamber, in arguing for the agreement. “It has been an emotional debate because it has been a debate about consequences.”
Thomas Donahue, secretary-treasure of the AFL-CIO, blamed the loss on “an orgy of dealmaking that produced a majority for this flawed agreement.”
President Clinton spent weeks twisting arms of reluctant House Democrats, using jawboning and raw dealmaking to secure votes. For example, he lured Plains state members with a deal to protect wheat growers and Florida members with a side deal protecting its citrus and winter-vegetable industries.
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The 20-member Illinois House delegation was one of the few from the so-called Rust Belt to cast a majority of its votes in favor of the trade pact, splitting 11-9 in favor. Democratic Reps. Dan Rostenkowski, Richard Durbin and Mel Reynolds supported the trade deal.
“Tonight the leaders of both parties found common ground in voting for the common good,” Clinton said moments after the vote.
In a gesture to organized labor, which lost the battle, Clinton said, “What I want them to do is join me now . . . in making sure the labor and environmental agreements are honored” and in shaping a training, retraining and job program that will “guarantee our workers the training we need to compete in the world marketplace.”
In the charged debate-punctuated by outbursts in the House gallery that led to about a dozen arrests of anti-NAFTA protesters-many Democrats sided with organized labor, which vehemently opposed the trade deal, insisting it would toss more Americans out of work.
Clinton, who had adopted a slightly modified version of the trade agreement first negotiated and championed by his presidential rival George Bush, asserted that NAFTA would spur economic growth in America and, as many economists have said, slightly boost employment.
The appeals of anti-NAFTA Democrats brought applause and cheers from the party’s majority in the House, and the chamber burst into laughter late in the debate when House Minority Leader Robert Michel (R-Ill.) referred to three of the most outspoken foes of the pact-former presidential candidates Ross Perot and Pat Buchanan and consumer activist Ralph Nader-as the “Groucho, Chico and Harpo of NAFTA opposition.”
Rep. Vic Fazio (D-Calif.), trying to bring divided Democrats back together, praised his colleagues on the other side who opposed NAFTA. “None of us are owned by labor,” he said. “None of us are coerced by business, and none of us are afraid of Ross Perot.”
Clinton felt confident rejecting the entreaties of labor. But for members of the House more closely aligned to the unions and facing re-election in less than a year, it was more difficult. They have reason to be wary: Unions and Perot have warned they would work to defeat members who supported the trade pact.
The trade agreement now goes to the Senate, where easy approval is expected as early as Friday.
Sources close to the White House said the president’s strong showing at the end was due in large part to behind-the-scenes efforts of congressional liaison Howard Paster and chief White House NAFTA advocate William Daley of Chicago, as well as members of Daley’s team, including former Chicago political operatives (and now White House aides) Rahm Emanuel and Paul Toback.
Their work, in addition to Chicago Mayor Richard Daley’s NAFTA endorsement, should help the city get more financial aid from Washington later in the Clinton presidency.
The House debated the accord around the clock, echoing visceral arguments heard across the nation this fall as opponents and supporters of NAFTA saturated the airwaves with advertisements, inundated lawmakers with calls and cards and staged political rallies.
NAFTA is “an insult to the working families of this country,” said Rep. David Bonior (D-Mich.), the third-highest-ranking Democrat in the House, who had bucked both the president and the House speaker to fight the trade deal.
“The work of America is still done by people who pack a lunch, punch a clock and pour their heart and soul into every paycheck,” he said. “And we can’t afford to leave them behind.”
But Rostenkowski said a vote for the treaty would mean a better economic future for Americans.
“We are debating whether America is a confident country-eager to face the future, ready to take on all competitors-or a nation in decline, clinging to memories of our past,” the Chicago Democrat said.