By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer

On the surface, at least, reaction to Thursday's historic House and Senate GOP agreement to end nearly 40 years of food and medicine sanctions against Cuba was a
paradox. Those who seemed happiest about the deal were those who had fought hardest against any easing of the embargo. One of them, Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart
(R-Fla.), called it "a tremendous victory."

But Democrats who have long supported a change in Cuba policy, and some Republicans who came to the issue more recently, were outraged. "I'm dumbfounded,"
said Rep. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.), who said the GOP leadership had acted "shamefully." Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) called the agreement "a real setback."

The agreement, these critics maintain, is not an agreement at all, but a heavy-handed imposition by a dictatorial GOP leadership that will not only leave sanctions
largely in place, but also will tighten them in the crucial area of restricting American travel to the island. In declaring the deal done, they argue, the leadership overrode
the will of both chambers expressed by a series of overwhelming anti-sanctions votes this year and last.

Although born of the Cold War, the Cuban embargo has been sustained well past the end of the Soviet empire by residual anticommunism in some sectors of
Congress, the fervor of hundreds of thousands of Cuban immigrants in this country, and the reluctance of most politicians to get involved in this briar-patch of an
issue.

Last year, farm-state Republicans, pressured by business and agricultural interests that want to end all unilateral food and medicine embargoes, began to rethink
Cuba policy. Others, such as Sanford, found troubling inconsistencies in arguments that diplomatic and trade rapprochement would push communist regimes in China
and Vietnam toward democracy but would have the opposite effect in Cuba.

For the second year in a row, the Senate voted last summer to end the food and medicine bans. The House, in its first-ever floor votes on the issue, voted 301 to
116 to lift the sanctions and 232 to 186 to end enforcement of restrictions on American travel to Cuba.

When it became clear that it could not kill the groundswell--and that its stubbornness was endangering the reelection of some farm-state members--the leadership
began to talk compromise. The final venue was the House-Senate conference on this year's agricultural spending bill, which all were interested in passing. But what
emerged, in the view of many proponents of easing the sanctions against Cuba, was no compromise at all. All Democrats on the conference committee voted against
it.

As announced, the agreement ends all unilateral U.S. food and medicine embargoes currently in effect--against Cuba, Iran, Libya, Sudan and North Korea--and
prohibits the president from ever again using such sanctions as an instrument of foreign policy without congressional permission. This has pleased some of the
sponsors of the original measure, including Rep. George R. Nethercutt (R-Wash.), who is in a tight reelection race and is now relieved of pressure by state wheat
farmers interested in sales to Iran.

Under the agreement, however, Cuba alone is prohibited from using U.S. government or commercial credits to purchase food or medicine--something that numerous
analysts have said will prevent the cash-strapped Cuban government from buying. Human rights activists have denounced it as continuing to punish the Cuban people
for the sins of their leader.

The agreement also removes the president's ability to ease or tighten restrictions on American travel, freezing current regulatory bans on all but one annual Cuban
American trip and narrow licensing of all others and freezing them into law, despite the overwhelming House vote to do the opposite. "I think it's wrong," President
Clinton said Friday.

The agreement, exulted Diaz-Balart, "constitutes a manifestation of solidarity by the U.S. Congress with the oppressed people of Cuba. The denial of credits and
tourism to the Cuban dictatorship constitutes an extraordinarily important victory for freedom." It is unlikely either the full Congress or Clinton will oppose the crucial
$80 billion agriculture bill to which the Cuba agreement is attached.

To Sanford, who is keeping a promise not to run again this year, "these kind of bitter pills are what exhaust normal people in the political process. . . . I think what
people long for is consistency, and the Republican Party shamefully has shown anything but that in their Cuba policy versus their China policy."

The reason, he believes, is money. "In the early days of this thing," he said, "I had gone to a noted free-trader who I'll define as a higher-up in the Republican Party. .
. . I said, 'Will you give me a hand on this [Cuba] thing?' And he said, 'Absolutely not. . . . I won't help you and in fact I'll work against it.' " The reason, Sanford said
he was told, is that "of all the different Hispanic groups out there, the only one that gives consistently and significantly to the Republican Party are the Cuban
Americans."

"This is all about rhetoric and elections," said Dodd. Farmers and businessmen now hailing the agreement as a success will soon come to their senses, he said. "The
wheat farmer in the state of Washington who all of a sudden thinks he can go down to Cuba and have a contract, the rice farmer in Missouri . . . he's in for a rude
awakening.

"The Cuban American family that wants to go down to Havana and see a dying father or mother" will find that there are now no exceptions to trip-limiting rules. But
none of that, he said, will happen in the four remaining weeks before the election.