Treaty awaiting Senate action enjoys broad public support
The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which enjoys the broad support of Americans, was submitted to Congress in September 1997. President Clinton has called on the Senate to approve the Treaty this year. A majority of Americans approve of that timetable. A recent nationwide poll showed 70 percent of the people, Republicans and Democrats alike, favor a treaty to prohibit further nuclear explosions worldwide. That support is reflected in the editorial pages of newspapers across the country, some of which are excerpted here. Los Angeles Times “In 1996 President Clinton became the first world leader to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which prohibits all nuclear weapon tests and other nuclear explosions. But the long-sought pact, which has since been signed by 147 other countries, still awaits U.S. Senate consideration. ...[I]naction threatens to prevent the United States from having a seat at the table next year when a special conference of nations that have ratified the treaty meets to		consider how the accord can be more quickly put into force. The possibility that the world’s leading nuclear power will be without a voice at that important meeting is as embarrassing as it is absurd. ... Presidents of both parties have always recognized the urgency of limiting access to nuclear weapon technology. ... It makes no sense now to deny the United States and the rest of the world the chance to further control the spread of nuclear arms.” The News and Observer, Raleigh, N.C. “The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty being considered by the Senate represents an invaluable chance to help put the nuclear weapons genie back in its bottle. The treaty ... would drastically reduce the nuclear threat by prohibiting all nuclear explosions, above and below ground. That prohibition would hamper rogue nations from building nuclear arsenals.... The Senate should ratify this enforceable worldwide agreement because it would be a large step toward eliminating the threat of nuclear warfare -- the ultimate act of defense.”

Denver Post “Colorado’s U.S. Sens. Wayne Allard and Ben Nighthorse Campbell should support the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty, both because it’s the right thing to do and because most Colorado voters appear to favor the pact. Achieving a nuclear weapons test ban has been a bipartisan priority since President Dwight Eisenhower’s administration. ... The Senate may be tempted to delay taking action. But any foot-dragging would be a terrible mistake, because it would undermine U.S. efforts to stop the spread of nuclear weapons worldwide.” Star Tribune, Minneapolis, Minn. “...[W]hat Americans should want is a global ban on nuclear testing. They can get it -- if only the U.S. Senate will ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. ... Skeptics to the contrary, this treaty is no threat to

anyone except the world’s rogues and rascals. In fact, it promises Americans a great deal: It would guard against the renewal of the nuclear arms race. It would block the path of atomic wannabes.... It would end the potential for environmental and health hazards from nuclear tests. For all that, America should be willing to give up an old habit.” Portland Press Herald, Portland, Maine “The world has a chance before the close of this century to do something extraordinary.... It can ban nuclear testing under a treaty signed [more than] a year ago. An important step in that process is ratification of the treaty by the U.S. Senate. ... Leadership from the United States on this issue ... is critical. The Senate should provide that leadership and ratify the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.”