Boland Amendment

The Boland Amendment is a term describing three U.S. legislative amendments between 1982 and 1984, all aimed at limiting U.S. government assistance to the Contras in Nicaragua. The first Boland Amendment was part of the House Appropriations Bill of 1982, which was attached as a rider to the Defense Appropriations Act of 1983, named for the Massachusetts Democrat, Representative Edward Boland, who authored it. The House of Representatives passed the Defense Appropriations Act 411–0 on December 8, 1982 and it was signed by President Ronald Reagan on December 21, 1982. The amendment outlawed U.S. assistance to the Contras for the purpose of overthrowing the Nicaraguan government, while allowing assistance for other purposes.

Beyond restricting overt U.S. support of the Contras, the most significant effect of the Boland Amendment was the Iran–Contra affair, during which the Reagan Administration circumvented the Amendment, without consent of Congress, in order to continue supplying arms to the Contras.

During the early years of the Reagan administration, a civil war raged in Nicaragua, pitting the revolutionary Sandinista government against Contra rebel groups. After the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) carried out a series of acts of sabotage without Congressional intelligence committees being made aware beforehand, the Boland Amendment was passed by Congress, cutting off appropriated funding for the Contras. Prior to its passage, an earlier amendment proposed by Tom Harkin that would have disallowed all funding for Contra efforts had failed to pass.

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