Welfare as the way most Americans know it may have changed on Tues., Sept. 19, when the Senate approved a plan by a margin of 87-12 which would overhaul the 60-year-old plan first enacted during the Roosevelt administration.
The new plan puts a five-year limit on welfare benefits, demands states put 50 percent of their welfare recipients to work by the year 2000, and rescinds the federal government's obligation to aid families meeting welfare requirements.
Senate Majority Leader Robert Dole (R-KS) said, "No more business as usual. No more tinkering around the edges with a system that has cost American taxpayers $5.4 trillion in federal and state spending over the past 35 years."
The House of Representatives' welfare plan limits benefits more aggressively. It bans unwed teenage mothers from receiving cash benefits and prohibits them from getting more aid based on how many children they have. President Bill Clinton, LAW '73, said he will veto anything similar to the House plan.
Peace in Sarajevo
Serbian forces began to lift their siege of Sarajevo on Fri., Sept. 15. The Serbs stopped their three-year siege after accepting a NATO-brokered deal which exchanged a pull-back from Sarajevo for an end to NATO air raids.
Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke led the NATO coalition in forging the accord. The original plan called for a 72-hour pause in air-strikes, but NATO renewed that suspension for another 72 hours on Sun., Sept. 17. The Bosnian Serbs completed their withdrawal of heavy weapons three days later.
Meanwhile, tensions have been growing near Banja Luku, a Bosnian-Serb stronghold near the new Bosnian border called for in the plan. Croatian-backed Bosnian troops had advanced within 25 miles of the city, but both Bosnian and Croatian governments vowed not to attack.
Still, a senior adviser to Croatian President Franjo Tudjman stated, "The Banja Luku area should become part of the Bosnian federation."
Hong Kong rejects pro-China legislature
In an apparent mandate to reject reunification with China in 1997, Hong Kong voted for pro-independence parties in its last legislative election under British rule on Sun., Sept. 17.
Hong Kong's Democratic Party, led by Martin C. Lee, emerged the biggest winner, as it trounced the Beijing-backed Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong. Officials in Beijing have said they would disband the Legislative Council once China regains the island.
Reacting to the results of the election, Lee commented, "Democrats have consistently pushed for genuine democracy over Britain and China's objection, because that is what the Hong Kong people want. We are capable of being masters of our own house and of our own destiny."
-- Compiled by Sumit De from The New York Times
Copyright 1995, The Yale Herald, Inc. All rights reserved.
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