Appropriations for FY1998: Defense (CRS Report for Congress)
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| Release Date |
Nov. 26, 1997 |
| Report Number |
97-205 |
| Report Type |
Report |
| Authors |
Stephen Daggett, Foreign Affairs and National Defense Division |
| Source Agency |
Congressional Research Service |
Summary:
On October 23, House and Senate conferees announced agreement on a compromise version of
the
FY1998 defense authorization bill, H.R. 1119 . The House approved the conference
report on October 28 by a vote of 268-123, and the Senate approved the agreement on November
6 by a vote of 90-10. The President signed the bill into law ( P.L. 105-85 ) on November 18. The
issue that had held up agreement in the conference for several weeks was how to allocate work
between public Air Force depots in Utah, Oklahoma, and Georgia and two recently privatized
facilities in California and Texas. The conference agreement included compromise language that
allows competition between the public and private facilities, as the Administration insisted, but with
conditions, including a requirement that "core" work essential to major missions be reserved for the
public depots. Senators from Texas and California opposed the compromise, however, and Office
of Management and Budget Director, Franklyn Raines, threatened a veto of the bill without changes
in the compromise language. No changes were made, however, and the President ultimately decided
to sign the bill.
Earlier, on September 25, the House and the Senate approved a conference agreement on the
FY 1998 defense appropriations bill, H.R. 2266 , and the President signed the bill into
law ( P.L. 105-56 ) on October 8. The agreement resolved differences between the two houses on a
number of contentious issues, including B-2 bomber funding, withdrawal of troops from Bosnia,
contractor teaming to produce the New Attack Submarine, some other shipbuilding programs, and
funding for tactical aircraft programs. The B-2 and Bosnia compromises avoided a threatened veto
by the White House. The authorization conference follows the appropriations on all of these issues.
On October 14, the White House announced that the President had exercised his line-item veto
authority to delete funding for 13 projects in the appropriations bill totaling $144 million.
The final version of the defense appropriations bill provides $247.7 billion in new budget
authority for defense programs, a compromise between the House-passed level of $248.3 billion and
the Senate level of $247.1 billion. The total is $3.8 billion above the Administration request. The
final military construction appropriations bill, H.R. 2016, which was approved in the
House on September 16 and in the Senate on September 17, provides an additional $9.2 billion for
the Department of Defense. Several other appropriations bills also provide funds for defense-related
activities of other agencies. With action on all of the bills completed, total funding for national
defense is close to the level of $268.2 billion recommended by the FY1998 congressional budget
resolution, which is $2.6 billion above the Administration request. The authorization conference
agreement also provides $268.2 billion.
