WASHINGTON: President Johnson`s proposal for a United Nations treaty to prevent sovereign claims to the moon and planets represents a hope that arms control may be easier to attain in space than on earth. Administration officials, discussion the proposed treaty, said that arms control was its most important aspect. Both the United States and the Soviet Union, the two principal space nations, have already denounced the concept of sovereign claims to celestial bodies.

But a treaty would `solemnise and codify` such sentiment s, Administration officials said. It might also provide an opportunity now to ban all weapons from space forever.

The proposal, announced at the Texas White House recently is the product of many months of discussions in key governmental agencies.

Among them were the State Department, the Defence Department including the Joint Chiefs of Staff the National Aeronautics and Space AdministrationandtheAtomicEnergyCommission.

While the proposal seemed to some observers merely to restate principles already adopted by the United Nations, those who helped draft it insist it contains several important new ideas.

They also deny that the proposal indicates a White House fear that the Soviet Union will land the first men on the moon. This was suggested in some newspaper articles following the announcement.

`There are a few things that make any patriotic breath beat, but that did it,` one man involved in the drafting said.

`In 1959, when we proposed a treaty to govern exploration of the Antarctic, no one suggested we were afraid of being squeezed out there. When we proposed a disarmament treaty, nobody suggested we did it because we had no atomic weapons.`Agencies