Newsmax touts Balanced Budget Amendment, ignores specifics and Founder’s preferred remedy.
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See: Fiscal Hawks Should Push for Balanced Budget, Not Debt Ceiling
Like most of our “mainstream media and elected officials” which Steve Levy mentions in his opinion piece, he is long on suggestions, especially in promoting a balanced budget amendment, but does so without offering the text of a specific balanced budget amendment.
To his credit, in focusing on the need for a balanced budget amendment, Mr. Levy is spot on in that a well-designed “. . . balanced budget requirement would force many . . .” needed spending cuts “. . . to be implemented by a recalcitrant big spending Congress.” The question is, does Mr. Levy have the text of a well-designed BBA in mind which meets necessary fundamental criteria such as:
Does it allow Congress to raise all necessary revenue, including in times of emergency?
Does it limit how Congress raises its revenue in a manner that is consistent with our nation’s founding principles?
Does it allow spending as found necessary by Congress during the course of a fiscal year?
Does it create a real and immediate moment of accountability for each State’s Congressional Delegation, when Congress borrows during the course of a fiscal year to meet its expenses?
Does it contain an escape clause rendering the amendment meaningless or allow Congress to effectively add to the national debt, year after year?
It may come as a surprise to Mr. Levy, that all of the above criteria is met in a favorable light and expressed in a number of our State Ratification documents, e.g. see the Ratification of the Constitution by the State of Massachusetts; February 6, 1788:
”Fourthly, That Congress do not lay direct Taxes but when the Monies arising from the Impost & Excise are insufficient for the publick exigencies nor then until Congress shall have first made a requisition upon the States to assess levy & pay their respective proportions of such Requisition agreeably to the Census fixed in the said Constitution; in such way & manner as the Legislature of the States shall think best, & in such case if any State shall neglect or refuse to pay its proportion pursuant to such requisition then Congress may assess & levy such State’s proportion together with interest thereon at the rate of Six per cent per annum from the time of payment prescribed in such requisition…”
The above method to extinguish a deficit cause by Congress’s borrowing has been promoted for the past thirty or so years as the “Fair Share Balanced Budget Amendment”
Since Mr. Levy is on board with promoting a balanced budget amendment, but has neglected to offer one for review, should he not comment on our founder’s remedy which, if added to our Constitution, would meet the objectives he expresses in his article?
JWK
"In matters of power let no more be heard of confidence in men, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."__ Thomas Jefferson’s Fair Copy of the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798
.
See: Fiscal Hawks Should Push for Balanced Budget, Not Debt Ceiling
Like most of our “mainstream media and elected officials” which Steve Levy mentions in his opinion piece, he is long on suggestions, especially in promoting a balanced budget amendment, but does so without offering the text of a specific balanced budget amendment.
To his credit, in focusing on the need for a balanced budget amendment, Mr. Levy is spot on in that a well-designed “. . . balanced budget requirement would force many . . .” needed spending cuts “. . . to be implemented by a recalcitrant big spending Congress.” The question is, does Mr. Levy have the text of a well-designed BBA in mind which meets necessary fundamental criteria such as:
Does it allow Congress to raise all necessary revenue, including in times of emergency?
Does it limit how Congress raises its revenue in a manner that is consistent with our nation’s founding principles?
Does it allow spending as found necessary by Congress during the course of a fiscal year?
Does it create a real and immediate moment of accountability for each State’s Congressional Delegation, when Congress borrows during the course of a fiscal year to meet its expenses?
Does it contain an escape clause rendering the amendment meaningless or allow Congress to effectively add to the national debt, year after year?
It may come as a surprise to Mr. Levy, that all of the above criteria is met in a favorable light and expressed in a number of our State Ratification documents, e.g. see the Ratification of the Constitution by the State of Massachusetts; February 6, 1788:
”Fourthly, That Congress do not lay direct Taxes but when the Monies arising from the Impost & Excise are insufficient for the publick exigencies nor then until Congress shall have first made a requisition upon the States to assess levy & pay their respective proportions of such Requisition agreeably to the Census fixed in the said Constitution; in such way & manner as the Legislature of the States shall think best, & in such case if any State shall neglect or refuse to pay its proportion pursuant to such requisition then Congress may assess & levy such State’s proportion together with interest thereon at the rate of Six per cent per annum from the time of payment prescribed in such requisition…”
The above method to extinguish a deficit cause by Congress’s borrowing has been promoted for the past thirty or so years as the “Fair Share Balanced Budget Amendment”
Since Mr. Levy is on board with promoting a balanced budget amendment, but has neglected to offer one for review, should he not comment on our founder’s remedy which, if added to our Constitution, would meet the objectives he expresses in his article?
JWK
"In matters of power let no more be heard of confidence in men, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution."__ Thomas Jefferson’s Fair Copy of the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798
