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Washington -- Against a backdrop of Social Security politics, the House unanimously approved legislation-boosting benefits for about 120,000 widows and older divorced women.

Despite the lopsided 418-0 vote Tuesday, during debate Democrats said millions more women should be helped and Republicans defended their broader proposals to create individual investment accounts as a supplement to Social Security.

``This may be one of the few bipartisan votes we'll have on Social Security,'' said Rep. E. Clay Shaw, R-Fla., chairman of the House Ways and Means subcommittee on Social Security.

Women tend to live longer and earn less than men, and those who work outside the home frequently take time away from the work force to care for children. Four in 10 depend on Social Security for their retirement income; the poverty rate among widows was 15 percent in 2000, compared with 8.5 percent for all elderly recipients.

The changes made by Shaw's bill, which would cost $4 billion over 10 years, would increase the benefit limit for widows whose spouses both retire and die before they reach full retirement age. It also would update eligibility requirements for disabled widows and repeal the two-year waiting period for divorced women who remarry to receive benefits.

Democrats favored Shaw's bill, as did such groups as AARP and the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare. Yet Democrats also accused Republicans of using the bill for political cover on an issue central to this year's congressional elections.

``You can just see how afraid they are of debate on that issue,'' said House Minority Whip Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

Rep. Robert Matsui, D-Calif., said Republicans refused to permit Democrats to offer a broader version providing a ``widow's guarantee'' that a spouse would receive 75 percent of a couple's combined benefits instead of as little as 50 percent when one died. That would affect 4.7 million widows and widowers, he said, including 1 million living in poverty.

Democrats have been pounding away on GOP proposals to set up personal retirement accounts that would be invested in the stock market, saying they threaten to undermine the guarantee that Social Security provides.

``Republicans want to spend trillions of dollars to privatize Social Security, and they want to wait until after the election to do it,'' said Matsui, the ranking Democrat on the Social Security subcommittee.

Republicans insist they would not ``privatize'' the main system, and the accounts would be both supplemental and voluntary. Shaw, who represents one of the nation's biggest populations of retirees in Florida, called the Democratic effort ``absolutely shameless. ... We're not going to privatize Social Security.''

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