News stories from Saturday October 29, 1977

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

The Senate gave a strong hint that it would approve some version of the crude oil tax that President Carter considers crucial in his energy program. By 47 to 30, the Senate rejected an amendment to the energy tax bill that would have put it on record as opposing any new tax on domestic crude oil.The Senate Finance Committee had rejected the tax, which is designed to force the price of domestic crude to rise to world levels and thus cut its use. And the Senate is not expected to take an up or down vote on it before completing action on the energy bill early this week. [Washington Post] Prospects that President Carter may delay his nine country foreign tour next month were dramatically increased today with the suggestion by Senate Majority Leader Robert Byrd that the President will be needed in Washington to lobby for his energy program. Byrd said he has grave doubts that the Senate and House will be able to complete action an the energy package before Nov. 22, the day Carter plans to leave on one of the most ambitious trips ever taken by a U.S. President. The West Virginia Democrat stopped short of calling for Carter to postpone the trip. But, he told his weekly news conference, "psychologically, it would be a good thing." Carter has previously indicated he would delay the trip if his energy program were in trouble. [Washington Post] The United States has sharply protested to the Soviet Union over what was apparently a bizarre attempt to blackmail an American diplomat on assignment in the Soviet Union into working as a Soviet intelligence agent. One knowledgeable source in Moscow called the incident the most serious harassment of an American diplomat here "in recent times." News of the incident leaked when the semi-official Soviet news agency Novosti released an article to Western news organizations in Moscow, accusing the diplomat, Constantine Warvariv, 52, of collaborating with the Nazis in the Ukraine during World War II.The U.S. protest note said a man who said he was a member of the KGB secret police entered Warvariv's hotel room in Soviet Georgia early in the morning of Oct. 19 and made similar accusations. He said he would make the charge public if Warvariv did not agree to give information to the KGB. The American diplomat was visiting Tblisi, Georgia, as deputy chief of the U.S, delegation to a U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization conference. He is a member of the U.S. delegation to UNESCO in Paris. [Washington Post] The nation's black mayors concluded a three-day meeting in Washington, DC asserting that, as the organized chief executives of more than 160 towns and cities throughout the country, they are a legitimate national leadership group for blacks. "Our feeling is that black Americans are dying for leadership and we intend to provide it," said A. J. Cooper Jr., mayor of Prichard, Ala., and president of the National Conference of Black Mayors. "We have a right to lead, we've been elected to lead and we shall lead."There are 161 black mayors in the country -- including 11 women -- and more than 100 attended the meeting. In an effort to assert leadership, the mayors passed nearly two dozen resolutions on U.S. foreign and domestic policy. These included appeals for more federal funds to assist development of cooperatives, aid to small towns for job training and public service programs, and for a federal energy stamp program similar to the food stamp program as well as some kind of "Marshall Plan" to revitalize urban and rural areas. The mayors also urged a strong national effort to increase affirmative action programs and called for the Supreme Court to uphold such programs in its decision regarding the Allan Bakke reverse discrimination case which is now pending. [Washington Post] In an attempt to exploit the Panama Canal treaties as a partisan issue, the Republican National Committee has enlisted Ronald Reagan to spearhead a massive mail campaign aimed at raising $2 million from treaty opponents. The committee is preparing to send a six-page fundraising letter, written and signed by the former California governor, to between a half million and a million people on its mailing lists. In the letter, the influential political conservative attacks the treaties as a surrender of vital U.S. strategic interests and calls for an all-out effort to block their approval by the Senate.The letter asks recipients to sign enclosed petitions opposing the treaties and to contribute "a minimum of two million dollars" to the Republican Party. "Unless these funds are raised," Reagan writes, "we won't defeat those Democrats who vote time and time again to support actions that weaken our national security." [Washington Post]