Kidogo's World

Kidogo's World: Fraudulent money and the shift of power

Balanced Budget Amendment

The Balanced Budget Amendment would provide a Constitutional pretext for increasing Federal revenues in order to match ever-expanding outlays.

Federal Watch

Balanced Budget Amendment

Will It Balance the Budget?

While we applaud the intentions with which the Balanced Budget Amendment was proposed, we believe its flaws would have resulted in more harm than good. It is now apparently dead in the water, but we here present the text of the proposal together with a discussion that reveals its flaws.

SJ Resolution 1

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled (two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That the following article is proposed as an amendment to the Constitution, which shall be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the Constitution when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years after the date of its submission to the States for ratification:

ARTICLE -- SECTION 1. Total outlays for any fiscal year shall not exceed total receipts for that fiscal year, unless three-fifths of the whole number of each House of Congress shall provide by law for a specific excess of outlays over receipts by a rollcall vote.

SECTION 2. The limit on the debt of the United States held by the public shall not be increased, unless three-fifths of the whole number of each House shall provide by law for such an increase bv a roll call vote.

SECTION 3. Prior to each fiscal year, the President shall transmit to the Congress a proposed budget for the United States Government for that fiscal year, in which total outlays do not exceed total receipts.

SECTION 4. No bill to increase revenue shall become law unless approved by a majority of the whole number of each House by a rollcall vote.

SECTION 5. The Congress may waive the provisions of this article for any fiscal year in which a declaration of war is in effect. The provisions of this article may be waived for any fiscal year in which the United States is engaged in military conflict which causes an imminent and serious military threat to national security and is so declared by a joint resolution, adopted by a majority of the whole number of each House, which becomes law.

SEFTION 6. The Congress shall enforce and implement this article by appropriate legislation, which may rely on estimates of outlays and receipts.

SECTION 7. Total receipts shall include all receipts of the United States Government except those derived from borrowing. Total outlays shall include all outlays of the United States government except for those for repayment of debt principal.

SECTION 8. This article shall take effect beginning with fiscal year 2002 or with the second fiscal year beginnning after its ratification, whichever is later.

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Questions that Might be Asked

Question:
Where in this proposed amendment is there any check on the growth in Federal spending, Federal revenues, or Federal debt?

Question:
How is a three-fifths vote any barrier to deficit spending?

Question:
What will prohibit the wording that allows "estimates of outlays and receipts" when enforcing the amendment, from being used to elude the purpose of the amendment altogether?

Question:
The Constitution already mandates a balanced budget. Why not just enforce the existing provisions?

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Statement of Howard Phillips, Chairman
The Conservative Caucus, Inc.
in Opposition to
The Proposed Balanced Budget Amendment
February 24, 1997
at the National Press Club
Washington, D.C.

Americans concerned about the relentless expansion of Federal taxes, spending, regulation, and debt should oppose the Balanced Budget Amendment (BBA) now being considered in Congress.

In our view, ratification of this amendment would risk the following adverse consequences:

1. It would provide a Constitutional pretext for increasing Federal revenues in order to match ever-expanding outlays.

2. Increased pressure would be brought to bear on the defense budget, which, politically, is an easier target for spending reductions than most other Federal budget components.

3. It would undermine the separation of powers established in the Constitution by assigning a primary legislative role to the President, which role has, heretofore, been, Constitutionally, the responsibility of Congress.

4. It would open the door wide for judicial intervention with respect to areas of authority that ought properly be reserved exclusively to either the Executive or Legislative Branches of our government rather than within the purview of the Judicial Branch.

5. The amendment, if enacted would increase disrespect for the Constituton by virtue of the fact that, although it advertises itself as a Balanced Budget Amendment, it simply shifts the requirement for deficit spending from 50% of the votes in Congress to 60%.

6. Forecasting Federal receipts with precision is virtually impossible. Yet the BBA would require that the President transmit to Congress a proposed budget in which total outlays do not exceed total receipts. Nothing in the amendment would preclude the President from declaring that receipts will amount to whatever total is necessary to equal outlays.

7. In the same vein, another section of the amendment declares that total outlays for any fiscal year shall not exceed total receipts for that year. As has been observed by Professor Robert Eisner of Northwestern University, "[t]hat is like putting in the Consitution a provision that rivers shall not overflow their banks, or that hours of darkness in New York City shall always be balanced by equal numbers of hours of daylight."

8. The intent of the amendment can be circumvented by redefining the meaning of both "receipts" and "outlays." If assets are sold, does the income from such sales reduce "outlays" within the meaning of the BBA?

We have a magnificent Constitution which, when followed, helps assure our nation's liberty, independence, and prosperity.

Although the BBA has been put forward with the best of intentions, to address the very real problem of expanding Federal indebtedness, this amendment would do far more harm than good.

The way to achieve a balanced budget, a surplus budget, a Constitutional budget, is for Congress to cut Federal spending and, when it fails to do so, for the President to veto excessive and inappropriate spending.

When politicians fail to do their duty in this regard, they should be fired. Unfortunately, we now have a situation in which politicians who have been derelict in doing their duty are blaming the Constitution instead of themselves.

If Congress sends this amendment to the states, The Conservative Caucus will relentlessly oppose its ratification -- state by state by state.

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For a more detailed discussion of this proposed amendment see the Howard Phillips Issues and Strategy Bulletin #562, November 30, 1996, as soon as it is posted on the US Taxpayers Party Issues and Strategy Bulletins Page.

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From Our Mail:

We have been asked where in the Constitution
is a balanced budget mandated.

(This is an excellent question and reaches the heart of the matter of the Constitution. Our email reply was returned, so we hope our correspondent returns to this page, so he can find it here.)

We Reply:

The mandate for a balanced budget lies in the lack of authority to go into perpetual debt. Article I, Section 8, is the list of enumerated powers. If an alleged power is not explicit there, the government does not have the power. Power to go into perpetual debt is not there, and could not be.

Let me explain:

Affirmed by the Tenth Amendment: all powers of the Federal government are delegated powers. (Delegated by the people, the sovereign rulers, under God.)

Delegated authority has to be delegated by an entity who originally has that authority. No one can give something he does not have. And no one has authority to act immorally.

To go into perpetual debt is immoral; it indentures future generations. No one has the moral authority to contract debt for other than himself. The people, not having that authority, could not delegate it to the government. All powers of the Federal government are delegated powers. The government has no other power.

The earth belongs to the living, not the dead. The will and the power of men expire with their lives, by nature's law ... Each generation has the usufruct of the earth during the period of its continuance ... We may consider each generation as a distinct nation, with a right, by the will of the majority, to bind themselves, but none to bind the succeeding generation ...
-- Thomas Jefferson, in a Letter to Eppes, June 24, 1813
Dr. Martin A. Larson, The IRS vs. the Middle Class, p.182

Remember the purpose of the Constitution.

It was only under the promise of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments, along with the other eight of the Bill of Rights, that most of the States consented to ratify the Constitution.The Ninth and Tenth were made specifically to remind us and our posterity, as well as our servants, of the purpose of the Constitution: that it was not to regulate the people, but to bind and regulate the government with tight reins.

The Ninth Amendment:

"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

The Tenth Amendment:

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

The Constitution is the charter of the masters to regulate the servants. If the people did not give the government a power, the government has no authority to exercise it.

Cheers.