In the Senate’s first votes on major immigration legislation in nearly a decade, two proposals to overhaul laws governing the status of migrant farm workers stalled yesterday after failing to clear procedural hurdles.

The votes highlighted unusual cleavages on the immigration issue within both political parties.

An agricultural immigration-reform measure sponsored by one of the Senate’s most conservative Republicans, Senator Craig of Idaho, and one of its most liberal Democrats, Senator Kennedy of Massachusetts, received 53 votes in favor and 45 opposed, falling short of the 60-senator majority needed to take action over minority objections.

That legislation, known as “AgJobs,” had the support of most farmworker groups, as well as unions and growers. The measure would allow illegal aliens who are regularly involved in agricultural work in America to receive temporary legal status and, over a six-year period, permanent residency. The legislation would also make it easier for growers to hire foreign workers legally through an existing visa program.

Proponents of the AgJobs plan said some senators were reluctant to attach the measure to the supplemental appropriations bill, which includes urgent funding for American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as disaster relief related to the Asian tsunami.

“We’re disappointed in the outcome of the vote, but it was a very difficult situation,” said an official with the Farmworkers Justice Fund, Bruce Goldstein. “A number of senators felt uncomfortable doing immigration in that context.”

Mr. Goldstein said he was heartened that the plan won a majority, if not all the votes it needed. “It demonstrated we have a bipartisan compromise that has substantial support,” he said.

While supporters of AgJobs speak of it as permitting “earned legalization,” critics say the proposal amounts to an amnesty for foreign workers who are breaking the law.

“There is no question this is an amnesty. There’s no way to get around that,” said a lobbyist who opposed the bill, Rosemary Jencks. “Not only does it give amnesty to illegal aliens, it invites former illegal aliens to come back and claim amnesty,” said Ms. Jencks, who works for a group that favors lower immigration levels, NumbersUSA.

Ms. Jencks also noted that the measure, which stemmed from a compromise between farmworker groups and growers, would actually roll back minimum-wage rates in the industry to 2003 levels. “It would ensure that agricultural workers are impoverished in perpetuity,” she said.

Several participants in the legislative battle predicted that the agricultural worker legislation would be brought to a vote again later this year. A more formidable challenge to the measure waits in the House, whose members and leadership are generally more inclined to tighten immigration controls.

An alternative proposal, which was seen as tougher on farmworkers and had little support in the industry, also failed yesterday on a lopsided 21-to-77 procedural vote. That measure was introduced by Senator Chambliss of Georgia, a Republican. It included some loosening of the migrant worker visa rules but no explicit path to legal status for farmworkers here illegally.

Senators Schumer and Clinton voted in favor of the Craig-Kennedy measure and against the alternative plan.

Not all Democrats support the AgJobs bill. In a floor debate last week, Senator Feinstein of California denounced the measure, saying it would amount to “nirvana” for illegal aliens. “The bill as drafted is a huge magnet” for illegal immigration, the senator warned.

Mrs. Feinstein’s comments drew the ire of farm worker groups.”She’s just totally off the wall,” said Marc Grossman of the United Farm Workers Union. “The nirvana statement – I can’t believe she would be so insensitive.”

About half of the country’s estimated 1.25 million illegal migrant workers are thought to toil in California fields. Somewhere between 40,000 and 70,000 migrants work in agriculture in New York State, according to Lew Papenfuse of Farmworker Legal Services in Rochester. “All the way up and down the Atlantic coast there are a great deal of people,” Mr. Papenfuse said. “There’s been an increase, for instance, in the Finger Lakes in the grape industry.”

Mr. Papenfuse said he supports the AgJobs legislation because it would make it harder for growers to impose unfair or unsafe working conditions on workers. “This makes it a lot easier for them to speak up,” he said. “It’s easier to exploit, when someone is undocumented and not under any program.”

However, Mr. Papenfuse expressed concerns about some aspects of the bill that he said could lock workers into a particular job. He said he worried that the more beneficial parts of the legislation may be stripped out as lawmakers make deals. “I would not be surprised if it is a skeleton by the time they get done, but hopefully not.”