TO AT LEAST one Congressman, a sugar bill posed no problem. The issue was simple, Representative William E. Miller of New York, chairman of the Republican Congressional Committee, told his colleagues: You are either for Castro or against him. Since few praises for Castro have sounded through the chambers of Congress recently, Miller’s analysis, if accurate, meant that a sugar bill could be legislated with ease, speed and clarity.

But the analysis was far from accurate, and when Congress, after a twenty-three-hour session during the Fourth of July weekend, finally did bring forth a sugar bill, its haggard members looked neither easy nor speedy nor clear. Their decisions had been shaped and pounded by unceasing and sometimes contradictory pressures — pressures so varied, fascinating and obvious that even a hurried survey of them can reveal some of the realities within our legislative process. The story of the 1960 Sugar Act is a case history in American politics.

Despite Miller, the issues turned on much more than an attitude toward the Cuban Premier. Did a Congressman come from a sugar-beet state, a sugar-cane state, or a state with large refineries? Did he trust President Eisenhower’s handling of foreign policy? Did he fear upsetting a program that had proven workable and beneficial to American farmers for so many years? Did he really think a cut in the sugar quota would hurt Castro? These are the issues that gave President Eisenhower the power to wipe out the Cuban sugar quota.

Just a month earlier, it had not seemed likely Congress would surrender this power. On June 1, the House Agriculture Committee, on a strict party vote of 23 to 12, reported a bill that would have merely extended the sugar program for one more year without giving the President any authority to change import quotas. The vote reflected the influence of the committee chairman, Rep. Harold D. Cooley (D., N.C.), a sixty-one-year-old student of foreign affairs who caused a stir in 1956 by refusing to sign the Southern Manifesto against racial integration.

Cooley opposed cutting Cuba’s sugar quota for several reasons. First of all, he had a program that worked. The quota premium paid to foreign exporters allowed American sugar growers with their higher costs to compete with foreign growers. The quota allotments to Cuba and other foreign nations assured a steady supply of sugar cane to the American seaboard refineries, which cannot handle the sugar beets grown in the West. And the quota premium gave nearby markets, such as Cuba, dollars to buy American goods.

In addition, Cooley contended that reducing the quota in reprisal against Castro constituted overt economic aggression against Cuba. And the Congressman questioned the wisdom of bringing the sugar program — essentially a domestic matter — into foreign policy.

BUT COOLEY misjudged the amount of Republican pressure for a cut in Cuba’s quota. When the Administration first asked for authority to reduce the quota, most observers thought the President wanted no more than a club he might wave, but seldom use. But, after the committee refused to give Eisenhower the authority, Miller issued his statement defining the battle as one between Democrats who favor Castro and Republicans who are against him. And Secretary of State Christian A. Herter came before the committee to plead the Administration’s case.

It was clear that the self-proclaimed American policy of patience and forbearance toward Cuba had come to an end. Cooley had to retreat or face a charge of refusing to support his President in the struggle against international communism.

NOW the real legislative battle began. Congress had to decide who would supply sugar in place of Cuba if the President ordered a reduction. The sugar-refinery interests, strong near the populous, Democratic coastal cities, wanted foreign sugar cane from countries like the Philippines to make up any cut. On the other hand, the sugar-beet interests, who have much of their strength in the sparsely populated, Republican Western states, wanted domestic growers to make up the difference. Cooley, like most House Democratic leaders, favored the viewpoint of the refineries; or, at least, felt in no mood to let the President hand out economic windfalls to Republican beet states, especially in the course of an election year.

On June 27, the House Agriculture Committee approved a new sugar bill, this time by unanimous vote. Its main provision authorized the President to set the Cuban sugar quota for the rest of 1960 and all of 1961 at a level no higher than the current quota. Any reduction would be allotted elsewhere in this way: a small amount to Costa Rica, Haiti, Panama, the Netherlands and Nationalist China, bringing each quota up to 10,000 tons; 15 per cent of the remainder to the Philippines; 85 per cent to all other nations, including the Dominican Republic. The committee-approved bill also switched a deficit of 160,000 tons in the quotas of Hawaii and Puerto Rico from Cuba to the mainland cane and beet producers. This last provision was the only one directly benefiting American beet producers. The bill came before the House on June 30 and, after a short debate, was approved 395 to 0.

THE SCENE shifted to the Senate, where the small sugar-beet states have greater power, and the struggle grew more dramatic. On Saturday, July 2, its final day of work before adjourning for the national conventions, the Senate refused to consider the House bill and, instead, unanimously passed a resolution, recommended by the Senate Finance Committee, which did no more than authorize the President to set the Cuban sugar quota for the rest of 1960.

The resolution grew out of anger, concern and pressure. The Senate did not like the idea that the House, which must originate revenue legislation, waited until the last moment before sending the sugar bill to the Senate, allowing almost no time to study it. The Senate felt its own resolution would give Eisenhower power to slap Castro around a bit and Congress time to consider thorough sugar legislation. In addition, the resolution appealed to the Senate’s foreign-relations experts because it assured some restraint on Eisenhower; he could not cut all of Cuba’s quota because the resolution gave him no power to find sugar elsewhere. And the sugar-beet people liked the resolution because it eliminated the House preference for foreign sugar-cane growers and gave domestic sugar-beet producers time to launch another fight for favorable legislation at the next session of Congress.

The House returned the Senate resolution immediately, calling it a new bill. Sugar legislation involves taxing of refined sugar and, under the Constitution, cannot originate in the Senate, the House said. In any case, its leaders confided, the House would not accept the Senate resolution even if it were legal.

At 11:10 P.M., the Senate took up the original House bill. Senator Wayne Morse (D., Ore.), proposed that the Senate simply amend the bill by substituting the wording of the resolution for the whole bill. In this way, the Senate would meet the constitutional objection of the House. As chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Latin America, Morse commands attention on Latin American matters, and he argued that once nations received new quotas because of a temporary cut in the Cuban quota, they would expect to keep the new allotments permanently. Republican sugar-beet Senators, who rarely agree with him on foreign policy or much else, immediately rallied to his side (Morse, incidentally, also represents a sugar-beet state).

BUT OPPOSITION came from Senator Everett M. Dirksen of Illinois, the Republican leader, who warned that the President “is quite insistent that he have a weapon with which to deal with the situation before Congress goes home.” He urged further that the House would never approve Morse’s proposal, since it had already turned down the identical Senate resolution. Dirksen’s arguments were bolstered by William B. Macomber, Jr.. Assistant Secretary of State for Congressional Liaison, and Bryce N. Harlow, Deputy Assistant to the President for Congressional Affairs, who wandered among the Congressmen to tell them Eisenhower would be furious if no bill were passed.

The Senate defeated Morse’s proposal by a vote of 30 to 29. Of the twenty-two sugar-beet Senators voting, thirteen voted with Morse and nine against; the sugar-cane Senators split three to one in Morse’s favor. Of the ten members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voting, the vote was eight to two in favor of the Morse proposal. This division was significant, indicating that Senators tended to accept Morse’s arguments as sincere expressions of concern rather than as a glib facade to cover any interest in Oregon sugar-beet fortunes. The party split was seventeen Republicans and twelve Democrats voting for Morse, six Republicans and twenty-four Democrats voting against.

After rejecting the substitute, the Senate approved the House bill with several amendments suggested by Senator Clinton P. Anderson (D., N.M.). In the main, these extended the Sugar Act to the end of this year rather than through 1961 and gave the President some leeway in deciding where to find sugar to make up for any cut in the Cuban quota. This leeway, of course, ran into opposition from the foreign sugarcane lobbyists, for they would receive mandatory allotments under the original House bill.

A little after 3:15 A.M., a conference committee of three Senators and six Representatives met to work out a compromise. In a two-hour session, the House members refused to accept the Senate amendments, and the Senators, faced with the prospect of taking the House bill or nothing, gave in. As a concession, the House conferees agreed that the bill would extend the program only through the first three months of 1961, rather than through the whole year. Both Houses passed the conference report, and at 8:51 o'clock Sunday morning, Congress adjourned. President Eisenhower had his weapon against Castro. He used it three days later.

IT IS TOO soon to gauge the effects of this hurried piece of legislation. But Congress must reach some conclusions soon. New legislation on sugar is possible in August and probable next January, and its character may depend on how much the new law and Eisenhower’s use of it have hurt Castro.

No official in Washington is predicting that the cut in the quota will ripple Castro. For one thing, the official line pictures Eisenhower’s action not as a form of reprisal, but as a way of protecting the American consumer from a possible shortage of sugar. Unofficially, however, there seems to be hope that the loss in revenue will hurt Castro by causing discontent among the 500,000 Cuban sugar-cane workers who face a possible cut in wages, and among the Cuban consumers who, it is believed here, face a shortage of wheat, rice, autos and machinery due to dwindling dollar reserves. If it becomes obvious, however, that Eisenhower’s action has rallied sympathy for Castro among other Latin American nations without hurting him materially, there will be strong support in Congress for legislation to take back the authority just granted the President.

But it is doubtful that Congress will restore the sugar program to what it was before the hectic Fourth of July weekend. Robert H. Shields, president of the U.S. Beet Sugar Association, hailed Eisenhower’s action as the end of an era, and his description underlined the real meaning of the 1960 Sugar Act.

Another marathon struggle is a certainty, perhaps this winter, with the beet growers and sugar refineries tugging and pulling in the background while the orators shout about Castro in front. Only this time, with a chance to set a pattern for a new era of sugar legislation, the shouting will be louder and the tugging and pulling more fierce.

STANLEY MEISLER is a wire service newsman now stationed in Washington.