The US Senate unanimously approved a sweeping corporate reform bill last night, reacting to serial corporate scandals with tough new oversight for accountants and stiff penalties for rogue executives.
With one eye on the troubled stock market and the other on upcoming congressional elections, the Senate voted 97-0 to send the measure to be reconciled with a more business-friendly bill passed by the House of Representatives in April.
"The crisis in our markets has put the plans and hopes and dreams of millions of Americans at risk," said the bill sponsor, Maryland Democrat Mr Paul Sarbanes, who urged quick action to restore market integrity and investor confidence.
The Sarbanes bill includes a new oversight board for the accounting industry, makes securities fraud a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison, and lengthens sentences for violations of existing laws.
President Bush, a Republican who revised his own prescriptions for corporate reform last week, said he was pleased by the passage of the Sarbanes bill but stopped short of embracing all its details.
"I urge the House and Senate leaders to get a bill to my desk before the August recess," Mr Bush said in a statement.
Debate over the elements of the Senate bill came last night as the stock market continued its bumpy ride after corporate scandals ranging from Enron's spectacular collapse to WorldCom's $3.85 billion mishandling of its books.
Stocks staged a late rally from huge early losses but blue-chip stocks, represented by the Dow Jones industrial average, closed lower for the sixth straight session.
Enjoying rare Senate unanimity behind a Democrat-backed measure that was once given long odds of escaping the chamber at all, Senate Majority leader Mr Tom Daschle, a South Dakota Democrat, proposed that the House skip the usual conference committee and just pass the Senate bill.