CONGRESS: Mr. President, We're in Trouble'

After conducting a briefing for congressional leaders last month on his fiscal 1977 budget, a concerned President Gerald Ford took aside a number of House Republican leaders. "We've got to win the override," the President said quietly.

Everyone in the group knew what Ford meant: the President had vetoed the $45 billion omnibus appropriation for health, welfare and labor programs late last year. Now the Democrats were rallying in an attempt to override the veto, and Ford was extremely anxious to foil them. The unwieldy bill contained $916 million for programs, mainly health, that the President felt the...

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