The U.S. Congress this afternoon approved an unprecedented $700 billion government bailout of the battered financial industry and sent it to President Bush for his certain signature.

The final vote, 263 to 171 in the House, capped two weeks of tumult in Congress and on Wall Street, punctuated by daily warnings that the country confronted the gravest economic crisis since the Great Depression if lawmakers failed to act.

* See tomorrow’s Royal Gazette for the full story.