WASHINGTON — Legislation authorizing key parts of President Bush’s anti-terrorism strategy advanced in Congress, setting up votes in the House and Senate.

A vote by a Senate committee to clear legislation authorizing Mr. Bush’s domestic eavesdropping program and another by a House panel to reconstitute military tribunals for terrorist suspects set the stage for a debate where some Republicans want more procedural rights for the accused.

The surveillance measure passed by the Senate Judiciary Committee on a 10–8, party-line vote would authorize a secret court to rule on the legality of the National Security Agency’s eavesdropping on phone calls between Al Qaeda operatives overseas and their suspected confederates in America without court warrants. Mr. Bush could continue the surveillance even if the court objects.

“It would be ironic to say that we can detect and attempt to disrupt and deter terrorist activities who are trying to kill innocent civilians in the United States and elsewhere, but we can’t listen to their phone calls,” Senator Cornyn of Texas, one of 10 Republicans who supported the legislation, said.

In the House, the Armed Services Committee voted 52–8 to approve legislation reconstituting military tribunals that were invalidated by the Supreme Court. The panel, hewing to a Bush administration proposal, defeated efforts to give defendants access to classified information that could be used to convict them.

Mr. Bush and Republican congressional leaders are emphasizing their efforts to combat terrorism as the November elections approach and polls show many voters are unhappy about the Iraq war and Mr. Bush’s leadership. Yet, a recent ABC News poll also showed that people trust Republicans more than Democrats to handle terrorism issues.

Democrats need a net gain of 15 seats in the House and six in the Senate to regain control of Congress. Still, the administration proposal on military tribunals is at odds with military lawyers and at least six Senate Republicans who want to ensure that defendants at the tribunals are not convicted with evidence that they cannot challenge.

Senator McCain of Arizona, a former prisoner of war who is leading efforts to change the military tribunal legislation, said negotiations with Bush administration officials were “still gridlocked.”

“They want to turn 200 years of criminal procedure on its head,” Mr. McCain said. Mr. McCain, Senator Warner of Virginia, who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Lindsey Graham, a Republican of South Carolina, are seeking a provision to let defendants see summaries of classified evidence that would not contain damaging secrets. They also want to bar coerced statements by the accused.

Mr. McCain predicted that the Republican majority leader, Senator Frist, does not have the required 60 votes to proceed with Mr. Bush’s tribunal proposal because of opposition from some Republicans plus Democrats. Both the House legislation and Mr. Bush’s proposal would allow classified evidence to be given to a defendant’s military lawyer, though the lawyer would not be permitted to share this with his client.

Mr. Warner scheduled a meeting of his panel tomorrow to vote on the version of legislation he is writing with Messrs. McCain and Graham. Mr. Bush agreed to the wording of the surveillance measure in negotiations with Senator Specter, a Republican of Pennsylvania, who chairs the panel.

By a series of 10–8 votes, the Republican-controlled committee defeated efforts by Democrats to change it.

The committee “acted as a rubber stamp for the administration’s abuse of power,” the director of the American Civil Liberties Union Washington Legislative Office, Caroline Fredrickson, said. “Instead of investigating lawbreaking, the Senate Judiciary Committee wants to make it legal.”

The panel did approve a competing proposal, backed by Democrats, that would streamline existing law to allow the eavesdropping with warrants. Mr. Specter, who voted to send the Democratic proposal to the Senate, predicted that the Republican-backed version that he negotiated with the president would win final approval.

Separately, the House Judiciary Committee postponed a vote on a measure sponsored by Rep. Heather Wilson, a Republican of New Mexico, that would conflict with the Senate legislation. House Republican leaders may be trying to rewrite her legislation to bring it closer to what the administration wants, Ms. Wilson said.

Mr. Specter’s legislation would not require Bush to submit the NSA program to a secret court for review. Still, the president agreed to do so if Congress passes the measure in the form approved yesterday in the committee.

Democrats such as Senator Feingold of Wisconsin voted against the measure, saying it would legalize Mr. Bush’s flouting of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which requires the president to seek court approved warrants to wiretap suspected spies and terrorists.

“We are confronted by a president who is breaking the law,” Mr. Feingold said. “What we would be doing by this legislation is institutionalizing and legislating the putting into law of the land the president walking all over us,” he said. Democrats also said Mr. Bush has refused to give lawmakers sufficient information about the program. Mr. Bush’s refusal forces Congress to legislate “almost in complete darkness” on the issue, Mr. Feingold said.

The administration contends that the Constitution gives the president authority as commander in chief to conduct eavesdropping without judicial review.