Government
Chronology of biological weapons treaty Biological weapons are made from living organisms that multiply in the environment and inside the victim, or are substances such as toxins excreted by living organisms. On Nov. 25, 1969, President Nixon unilaterally declared that the U.S. renounced biological warfare and ordered nearly all U.S. stocks destroyed, retaining only small amounts for research on defensive measures. On April 10, 1972, the Biological Weapons Convention was signed in Washington, London, and Moscow. To date, 111 nations have agreed to abide by the terms of the treaty. On Dec. 16, 1974, the U.S. Senate unanimously ratified the treaty. On March 26, 1975, the treaty entered into force.
President Bush just vetoed. Kastenmeier's bill "just couldn't wade through/' Applebaum explains. That slew of immigration bills can't explain the decade-plus delay in integrating the international treaty into the domestic criminal code, however. The White House had initially proposed legislation similar to Kohl's and Kastenmeier's bills in 1973, but Congress failed to act until this year for two reasons, Kohl's aide Keenen Peck explains. "It slipped through the cracks due largely to the bureaucratic nature of legislating," Peck says. "This year a freshman Senator took an interest in the issue and had the time to devote to its passage." But more importantly, in more recent years there was no Administration support for an implementing bill. "The previous Administration believed that this kind of legislation was not necessary, that existing environmental [Toxic Substances Control Act] and export control laws sufficed," Peck says. Kohl and the Bush Administration think otherwise. So there is a very good chance that legislation implementing the Biological Weapons Convention into domestic law will become the law of the land next year, 16 years after the U.S. ratified the treaty. Lois Ember 14
December 11, 1989 C&EN
Slight reprieve for R&D in budget compromise In the final days of its first session the 101st Congress cleared a number of bills of interest to the chemical community. First and foremost was the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1989, H.R. 3299, which was designed to get the federal budget within shouting distance of the $110 billion Gramm-Rudman-Hollings deficit reduction target for fiscal 1990. To meet that target Congress at least partially acquiesced to the across-the-board cuts in federal spending ordered by President Bush on Oct. 16. It was expected that the reconciliation bill would restore fiscal 1990 spending to the levels approved by Congress in the 13 appropriations bills. Instead, the order will remain in effect for four months and one week, resulting in savings of $4.6 billion. The bill provides for total savings of $17.76 billion in fiscal 1990. That includes $5.7 billion in new revenues. A report prepared by the minority staff of the Senate Budget Committee estimated that if the original sequester order had remained in effect for the whole fiscal year National Institutes of Health funding of $7.7 billion would have been reduced roughly $400 million, to a level only 2% over the fiscal 1989 appropriation of $7.1 billion. Because of cost increases in NIH grants, the report said, this reduction could cut funding for about 1000 new NIH research grants and cut the number of scientists receiving grants more than 500. The situation now is not that dire, but a sequester that remains in effect for over a quarter of the fiscal year is bound to have deleterious effects on research funding. Although the Senate went to conference with the House on H.R. 3299 insisting on a clean bill that did nothing more than raise revenues or slash federal spending, the final version of the bill does extend until Sept. 30, 1990, a number of tax credits that either had expired or were due to expire. One which expired last Dec. 31 and was extended retroactively, allows an individual to exclude from gross income the value up to $5250 of employerprovided educational assistance. The
exclusion does not apply to money an employer provides for graduate level courses. The bill extends until Dec. 31, 1990, with some modification, the 20% tax credit allowed for increase in a company's R&D spending over a base level and the 20% credit for certain corporate expenditures for university basic research. Both were due to expire on Dec. 31. And it sets a new formula for allocating a company's R&D expenses between domestic and foreign source income that is effective for the first taxable year beginning after Aug. 1, 1989, and before Aug. 2, 1990. The original House bill would have made all these provisions a permanent part of the tax code. The one-year extension means they will all have to be looked at again next year. The reconciliation bill also contains one provision that affects all workers. The conferees agree to raise the 1990 Social Security wage base from $50,400 to $51,300 and index it annually for inflation thereafter. On other money fronts, Congress cleared the last of the fiscal 1990 appropriations bills shortly before it recessed for the year. The Department of Defense appropriations bill contains a total, before the 130-day sequester, of $37 billion for research, development, test, and evaluation activities. That amount is 6% less than the budget request and 1% less than DOD had to spend in fiscal 1989. It includes $3.6 billion, an essentially level budget, for the Strategic Defense Initiative; $194 million for the national aerospace plane; and $96 million for university research initiatives. The House stripped from the DOD appropriation bill a provision adopted by the conference committee providing $61.2 million in research and construction grants to seven universities. The bill had provided: • $15 million for the National Center for Industrial Innovation at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania. • $13 million for the University of Scranton Technology Center, New York. • $12 million for the acquisition, design, testing, integration, and advancement of a prototype supercom-
p u t e r system at the M i n n e s o t a Supercomputer Center. • $8 million for the proposed Center for Commerce & Industrial Expansion at Loyola University of Chicago. • $6 million for the Center for Technology Management at Alabama's Auburn University. • $5.2 million for the proposed Center for Environmental Medicine at the Medical College of Ohio, Rootstown, Ohio. • $2 million for the pilot program for combat casualty care management and research at the Martin Luther King Jr. General Hospital/ Charles R. Drew University of Medicine & Science, Los Angeles, Calif. None of the earmarked funds were contained in either the House or the Senate version of the DOD appropriation bill before it went to conference. Rep. Don Ritter (R.-Pa.) argued strongly for retaining the funding, saying that "we have an opportunity here [to use] a very tiny, tiny percentage of this DOD appropriation bill to support the kind of research and development infrastructure at our universities that we have simply not had the opportunity to support otherwise, given the nature of the bureaucratic competition." However, the provision was stricken from the bill on the grounds that it was not germane to the subject matter under consideration. The agriculture appropriation bill, which was one of the last of the research funding bills to clear Congress, provides $591 million, 2% more than requested and 5% higher than fiscal 1989 funding levels, for the Agricultural Research Service. The Cooperative State Research Service would get $342 million, 16% more than requested and 8% above 1989 levels. The CSRS budget includes $43 million for competitive research grants and $661,000 for research on acid precipitation. Congress earmarked almost all of the money contained in a separate, $46 million CSRS buildings and facilities account for planning a n d / o r construction of research facilities at some 32 specific universities. No attempt was made to delete the designated funding from this appropriation bill.
In another area, the House approved comprehensive oil spill legislation, H.R. 1465. The Senate approved its oil spill bill in August. Both bills set up a federal liability and compensation system for oil spill cleanup costs and damages and set fairly high limits on how much of the cost must be borne by parties responsible for a spill. The remaining costs would be paid for by a $1 billion federal trust fund financed by a 5 cents-a-barrel fee on domestic and imported oil and petroleum products. The fund also would be used to finance to the tune of up to $28 million per year, a wide ranging research, development, and demonstration program on new or improved technologies and systems, including mechanical, chemical, biological, or other m e t h o d s , for preventing or cleaning up oil spills. Differences between the two bills will be resolved by a conference committee after Congress returns in January.
In its final days in session, Congress also cleared legislation reauthorizing for the first time in several years the Department of Energy's research programs on renewable energy sources and energy-efficient technologies. The legislation also gives the Secretary of Energy authority to enter into joint R&D projects with the private sector for demonstrating the commercial viability of promising technologies. The cost of each project would be split 50-50 between the government and the private sector. In addition, Congress sent to the White House legislation authorizing the Secretary of Agriculture to conduct research in conjunction with colleges and universities, other federal agencies, and private entities on the development of new commercial products derived from natural plant materials for industrial, medical, a n d agricultural applications. Janice Long
Call CAS for 24-Hour Substance Identification Service! Need to identify 1 to 5 substances by CAS Registry Number SM or name? Call us with your CAS Registry numbers or names between 8 AM and 4 PM Eastern time at 800-848-6538, or telefax your order to 614-447-3747. Be sure to ask for the 4 '24-hour service." 1 We 11 rush you the substance identification you need by telephone or telefax within 24 hours,* or your information is free! For prices and information about other CAS Registry Services, ask for your free brochure.
ms
Chemical Abstracts Service is a division of the American Chemical Society.
* (excluding weekends and holidays)
December 11, 1989 C&EN
15
