Conservatives Mobilize Against Law of the Sea Treaty

U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)

UNCLOS establishes a new international legal regime, including an International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea and an International Seabed Authority, to govern activities on, over, and under the world's oceans. The treaty explicitly governs seven-tenths of the world's surface and could easily be interpreted to restrict U.S. military activities. Also regarded as an environmental treaty that provides a backdoor for implementing the unratified Kyoto Protocol or global warming treaty, the provisions of UNCLOS would permit international rules and regulations governing economic and industrial activities on the remaining land area of the world in order to combat perceived pollution dangers. The treaty provides for the taxing of U.S. and other corporations which mine the ocean floor, thereby establishing the first independent source of revenue for the U.N.

The push for UNCLOS has been fed by erroneous news accounts that the U.S. would have to ratify the treaty in order to cash in on oil, gas and minerals in the Arctic and other areas. In fact, the UNCLOS tribunal and associated “dispute resolution” panels, which are dominated by foreign judges, are almost certain to issue rulings and decisions that go against American interests.

... and President Bush desperately wants it!

... the Bush Administration is supporting a plan by Senator Joseph Biden, D-De., to stage a Foreign Relations Committee hearing on September 27 in order to usher the controversial U.N. Law of the Sea Treaty to the Senate floor for a quick vote. Biden, chairman of the committee and a Democratic presidential candidate, was a leader of the effort to defeat Bush’s pick of John Bolton as U.S. Ambassador to the U.N.

Conservatives are hoping the facts about President Reagan’s rejection of the measure, mainly on the grounds that it was a socialist trap for America that subjected U.S. companies to a global tax, can eventually persuade 34 Senators to block its ratification.

... How can anyone calling themselves a conservative continue to support President Bush?