SETBACK FOR FULBRIGHT

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31004, 9 March 1966, Page 13

SETBACK FOR FULBRIGHT

(N.Z.P.A. Reuter —Copyright) WASHINGTON, March 8 Senator William Fulbright’s drive to limit President Johnson’s authority to deploy U.S. armed forces overseas received a setback today from members of his own foreign relations committee.

The Senator, chairman of the committee, found a majority of his colleagues ranged against him when he tried to attach a restrictive amendment to a Bill authorising 415 million dollars in supplemental foreign economic funds, mostly for South Vietnam. The committee voted 18 to one for the Bill. In approving the authorisation, the committee by a vote of 13 to six, rejected Senator Fulbright’s amendment saying that the furnishing of economic and military aid to any country could not be construed as a commitment to defend that country with armed I forces. Further Amendment

Also rejected was an amendment from Senator George McGovern who, like Senator Fulbright, has expressed deep reservations about the possi-

bility of a general Asian war growing out of the Vietnam conflict. Senator McGovern’s defeated amendment stated that approval of the Bill involved no endorsement of the President’s conduct of the Vietnam war.

Action Threatened. A Rhodesian firm of toilet roll paper manufacturers has threatened legal action against people overprinting its products with a caricature of the British Prime Minister, Mr Harold Wilson.—Salisbury, March 8.