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The Soviets complained that the resolution would politically divide the profession—a hint that Western psychiatrists might lose access to Soviet colleagues if the vote went against the U.S.S.R. But the most effective Soviet argument in effect asked: How can you question the diagnosis of mental patients without examining those patients or their records?
Just before the vote, Soviet representatives released to the delegates—but not to the press—the psychiatric records of dissidents in mental hospitals. According to the U.S.'s Howard Rome, current president of the World Psychiatric Association, the unexpected Soviet move helped make the vote close. The anti-Soviet resolution was endorsed by only 19 of the 58 voting societies, but passed by the two-vote margin because of proportional voting weighted according to the number of members each nation has in the world group. Jack Weinberg, president of the American Psychiatric Association, declared himself "saddened" by the need to condemn the Soviet psychiatric abuse but "gratified that we were able to speak up and not be intimidated by any harsh accusations that it is slander."