WASHINGTON - The Senate has voted to deny disability benefits to veterans with smoking-related illnesses, using a procedure the national commander of the American Legion described as "sleight of hand."
Just hours before the Senate approved its $1.73 trillion 1999 budget this week, Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV, D-W.Va., offered an amendment that would allocate $10.5 billion for treating smoking-related illnesses over the next five years. It passed 98-0.
But the purpose of that vote apparently was to allow senators to show support for veterans.
Moments later, the Senate voted 52-46 on an amendment by Budget Chairman Pete Domenici, R-N.M., to shift the $10.6 billion to highways while the issue of smoking-related illnesses is studied for a year.
"We ought to take a little bit of time before we get involved in a $10 billion . . . program," Domenici said, noting that President Clinton had recommended using that money for highways.
However, Rockefeller called the one-year study "a farce" because it would be done by foes of the money going to veterans: the White House Office of Management and Budget, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the General Accounting Office.
American Legion Commander Anthony Jordan yesterday called the vote "a breathtaking display of contempt" and said veterans deserve the coverage because of a military tradition of encouraging smoking.
That tradition dates to the Civil War, when military post exchanges started selling tobacco products at discounted prices. The military was slow to require health-warning labels be put on tobacco products, and well into the 1970s free cigarettes were distributed with C-rations in the field.
Clinton and the Veterans Administration want veterans with smoking-related illnesses to get benefits only if a diagnosis of cancer or other smoking-related disease was made while on active duty.
The administration rejects the contention of veterans that benefits are justified because such diseases may not show up until years after someone quits smoking.
The VA halted processing of smoking-related claims while it worked on regulations but resumed the process last year. Of the 3,400 claims filed in 1997, 278 have been approved.
Their cost is a few million dollars - not $10.5 billion.
The fight is certain to shift to the House, which is expected to pass a budget next month.
