[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 19 (Tuesday, January 31, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1823-S1841]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




             BALANCED BUDGET AMENDMENT TO THE CONSTITUTION

  The Senate continued with the consideration of the joint resolution.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The pending business is House Joint Resolution 
1, the balanced budget amendment.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Thank you, Mr. President.
  Mr. President, in 1992, I campaigned for the Senate as a supporter of 
the balanced budget amendment. I was an original cosponsor of the 
amendment voted on in the last Congress, Senate Joint Resolution 41, 
and I am an original cosponsor of the amendment being considered today. 
Yet, despite my consistent, outspoken record on this issue, my backing 
of the balanced budget amendment surprises some people.
  In fact, Mr. President, I would add that I went to mass on Sunday, 
and the social justice committee had:

       Senator Moseley-Braun is a possible ``no.'' Please contact 
     her to be against this amendment.

  So I want to clarify the record, and I want early on to take this 
opportunity to tell those of you in this body and my constituents 
listening at home on C-SPAN why I so strongly believe it is imperative 
that Congress pass the balanced budget amendment and without delay.
  I come from a working class family. My father was a Chicago police 
officer. My mother was a laboratory technician. We were not what you 
would call wealthy, or upper-middle class. We did not have a lot of 
material goods, and my parents couldn't afford to send us to fancy 
private schools. My parents had to keep track of every dollar to keep 
us fed, clothed, and housed. Yet, like hundreds of thousands of other 
children of working class families in this Nation, I was able to get 
ahead in life, to succeed, because the sacrifices my parents made 
provided me with the opportunity to do better.
  I was able to get a first-rate education by attending quality public 
schools on the south side of Chicago. I got my first job when I was 
just 15 years old. To earn extra money for college, I worked as a clerk 
at the Chicago Post Office. I attended the University of Illinois at 
Chicago, and then the University of Chicago Law School, because student 
loans were available to help me pay the tuition. All of these 
opportunities--opportunities that would not have been available without 
local, State, and Federal Government assistance--gave me the tools I 
needed to achieve in life.
  The fact that the public--through Government--helped broaden my 
opportunities is part of what led me to choose a career in public 
service. I ran for the Senate in 1992 for the same reason I ran for the 
State legislature in 1978--because I am fundamentally committed to 
ensuring that future generations have the same opportunities I enjoyed. 
Every child born in this country--whether black or white, whether rich 
or poor--should have the chance to achieve his or her dreams. Every 
person should have a chance to contribute to society, to the maximum 
extent their talent or ability will allow.
  Government should play an active role in expanding people's 
opportunities. The Government should be able to invest in technology 
and infrastructure, in job creation and training, and in education, in 
order to raise the people's living standards. The Government should 
help unemployed Americans get back on their feet, it should help those 
who
 want to work to find jobs, it should ensure that high-quality, 
affordable health care is available to all Americans, and it should 
protect our environment. Government is not the enemy of society; it 
should be a partner, an instrument of the people's will, and a 
facilitator of our public interests. But if the Government does not get 
its fiscal house in order--if we 
[[Page S1824]] don't act now to stop our runaway deficit spending--the 
Government will have little money left to provide for the public 
interest. Only the holders of the Treasury bonds will be assured of any 
Government assistance.
  I am going to tell a story today that some in this body may have 
heard before. Back in 1991, when I was being urged by a number of 
people to run for the Senate, I sat down with my son, Matt, to discuss 
the issue. Matt is now 17. He was 15 at the time. As you know, Mr. 
President, running for office is a tremendous strain on a family; I did 
not want to make a decision that big without discussing it with Matt 
first. And, during the course of that conversation, he said something I 
will never forget. He said, ``You know Mom, your generation is the 
first one that has left this world worse than you found it.''
  Now, as you can imagine, those words were like a knife to my heart. 
The thought that Matt might be right sent a chill down my spine and the 
notion that my generation would leave the world worse off than we found 
it gave me the push I needed to get involved in running for the Senate. 
And I am bound and determined to use my tenure in the Senate to prove 
Matthew wrong, to show him that his generation will have more 
opportunities and a better life than my generation. I want him to know 
that the American dream is alive and well--and that his future is a 
bright one. That is why I am fighting to see that the balanced budget 
amendment becomes part of the U.S. Constitution.
  Mr. President, I was privileged to have served as a member of the 
President's Bipartisan Commission on Entitlement and Tax Reform--the 
so-called Kerrey-Danforth Commission. Some might say that serving on 
the Entitlements Commission was more of a curse, but I welcomed the 
challenge. Serving on the Commission allowed me to take a close look at 
our current budget trends, and at how those numbers will affect our 
ability to meet important priorities, like retirement security, and 
health care security, not just for current recipients, but for Matt's 
generation and beyond.
  The final report of the Commission, issued last December, confirmed 
what most of us already know: Unless we get the deficit under control, 
we will be leaving our children--and our children's children--a legacy 
of debt that will make it impossible for them to achieve the American 
dream of living a better life than their parents.
  I would like to take a moment to discuss those numbers. There have 
been and there will be a great many facts and figures talked about here 
in the debate on the balanced budget amendment. I know, frankly, that 
numbers have a tendency to make people's eyes glaze over. I want to 
discuss some of the numbers because they are so profoundly important to 
our future as a country and to the kinds of opportunities that will be 
available to future generations.
  Most Americans, or I hope most, know that, thanks to the 1993 budget 
approved by this Congress, the budget submitted by President Clinton, 
Federal budget deficits are declining in the short term. The deficit is 
projected to remain under $200 billion through 1998. That would place 
it at about 2.5 percent of the economy--its lowest level since the 
1970's. We can and should be proud of that, Mr. President. The 1993 
budget deal represented a serious attempt to attack the deficit, and 
our economy has benefited as a result of it.
  What Americans do not know is that after 1998, unless we change 
course, the deficit will begin rising again rapidly, reaching $400 
billion by 2004. As early as 2012--and again when you say 2000, it 
sounds like a long way off, but we are only talking 5 years from now, 
to the turn of the century. In 2012, entitlement spending and interest 
on the national debt alone will consume all tax revenues collected by 
the Federal Government, leaving nothing at all--nothing--for defense 
spending, housing, Head Start, education, protection to the 
environment, transportation, and science research. Nothing.
  What is driving this trend, Mr. President? Despite what people would 
like to believe, frankly, the catalyst behind our growing budget 
deficit is not $600 toilet seats or Air Force generals taking $200,000 
plane rides. There is no line item in this budget labeled ``fraud, 
waste, and abuse'' that we can line out and get rid of; nor is the 
deficit growing due to the amount the Congress spends for the 
Corporation for Public Broadcasting or for food stamps or anything else 
that seems to consume the conversation on talk radio.
  What we spend at home is actually lower now as a percentage of our 
economy than it was 25 years ago. If you examine a brief snapshot of 
the 1994 budget, this becomes clear. In 1994, the Federal budget 
allocated approximately $270 billion for defense spending, $335 billion 
for Social Security spending, $155 billion for Medicare, and $95 
billion for Medicaid. All other entitlement programs combined total 
$185 billion, while interest on the national debt consumed $210 
billion.
  Discretionary domestic spending, which is often blamed again in 
popular conversation with leading the country to the brink of financial 
ruin, accounted for approximately $250 billion.
  Mr. President, I do not mean to imply that the $250 billion we spent 
on discretionary items in 1994 is not a lot of money or that there is 
not room in that figure for further discipline and cutting. But we have 
to be honest with ourselves and with the American people. In light of 
the amount of money and percentage of the Federal budget we are 
spending on all of the programs I listed above, discretionary spending 
alone cannot bear the sole blame for our budget deficits. If we want to 
get ourselves out of the hole we have dug ourselves into, we cannot 
focus exclusively, or even primarily, on discretionary spending.
  So where are the problems? What drives this budget deficit? Why is it 
so persistent? In a nutshell, there are two major problems: The rapidly 
rising costs of medical care, and the changing demographics of the 
American population are the most important forces driving the Federal 
budget.
  Based on current trends, Federal health care expenses will triple as 
a percentage of the economy by 2030. Federal health care costs, which 
consist primarily of Medicare and Medicaid, grew at rates exceeding 10 
percent for 5 years in a row. While they are currently growing at 
slightly lower rates due to changes in the private sector, those rates, 
frankly, are still unaffordable. Due to the rapid growth, the Medicare 
hospital insurance trust fund will go broke by 2001.
  Clearly, this is a far more serious problem than just welfare reform, 
which makes up 1 percent of the Federal budget. AFDC and food stamps 
are not growing anywhere near the rate Medicare and Medicaid are. In 
fact, AFDC benefits, again, have declined by more than 40 percent in 
real terms since 1970. That is not to suggest that we do not need to 
reform our welfare system; we do and we will. But anybody who suggests 
that the budget can be balanced by reforming welfare is being less than 
honest with the American people.
  The Chicago Tribune recently ran an editorial on the subject of 
health care, underscoring the need to control health care costs if we 
are to get serious about the balanced budget. I would like to quote 
briefly from that piece.
  It stated:

       But if this Congress is serious about bringing the Federal 
     budget into balance, something must be done to stem the 
     still-rising cost of health care. Health reform isn't 
     mentioned in the Contract With America, but unless some 
     changes are made, several of the GOP's other goals will prove 
     beyond reach.

  Mr. President, I think the first goal will prove to be out of reach. 
If we do not control health care costs, we will not be able to achieve 
a balanced budget.
  Rising health care costs are not the only problem we have to contend 
with. We must also confront the second leg of this dilemma, which is 
the ``graying'' of America, due both to longer life expectancy and the 
aging of the baby boomers.
  When the Social Security system was established, the average life 
expectancy was 61 years old; now it is 76 years old. We cannot ignore 
this because the Social Security benefits are funded primarily by 
payroll taxes on current workers. As our population ages and as the 
baby boom generation retires, there will be fewer workers to support 
more retirees. While in 1990 there were almost five workers for each 
retiree, in 2030 there will be less than three. What 
[[Page S1825]] this means is that if current trends remain unchanged, 
the Social Security trust fund will begin to pay out more than it takes 
in by the year 2012. By 2029, the fund will have exhausted all of its 
previously accumulated surpluses.
  Mr. President, there is simply no way to get around the fact that our 
present spending trends are not sustainable in the long run. In 1963, 
mandatory spending, which is the combination of entitlement programs 
and interest on the national debt, comprised 29.6 percent of the 
Federal budget. By 1983, that number had almost doubled, to 56.3 
percent.
  Ten years later, in 1993, mandatory spending was 61.4 percent of the 
annual budget. Let me underscore that. Today, mandatory spending--
entitlements plus interest on the national debt--comprise almost two-
thirds of the entire Federal budget.
  What about the future? If we do not act now, by the year 2003, which 
is only 8 years from now--and again, these numbers sound further out 
than they are--mandatory spending will comprise 72 percent of the 
Federal budget, 58.2 percent for entitlement programs and 13.8 percent 
for net interest on the debt. Obviously, if we are spending 72 percent 
of the budget on mandatory spending, there will not be much left over 
for defense, education, and infrastructure.
  The budget deficit also has disastrous implications for our private 
savings. Countries that save at higher rates grow faster and have a 
more rapid increase in the standard of living than countries that save 
at lower rates. In the United States, as our budget deficits and 
national debt grow, our private savings decline, we limit our 
investments, our productivity, and our economic growth and, therefore, 
our job production.
  Since the 1960's, private savings have dropped from more than 8 
percent of the economy to around 5 percent of the economy. At the same 
time, Government deficits have risen from less than 1 percent of the 
economy to more than 3 percent of the economy. As a result, the supply 
of savings available for private investment--our net national savings--
has dropped from more than 8 percent of the economy in the 1960's to 
less than 2 percent today. This is particularly harmful for us with 
regard to our international competitiveness in this new global economy.
  In today's increasingly global economy, our major industrial 
competitors are saving and investing at a much greater rate than we 
are. Japan's national savings from 1983 to 1992 totaled approximately 
18 percent of its gross domestic product, while the European 
Community's savings totaled around 8 percent. If we want to stay 
competitive in the global marketplace, we can and we must do better; 
again, another reason to support the balanced budget amendment.
  Mr. President, earlier, I mentioned that AFDC benefits have declined 
since 1970. The significance of that fact should not be lost. We are 
spending ourselves into a deeper and deeper hole, and yet people who 
need help from Government are not better off as a result.
  I live less than 2 miles from the Robert Taylor homes in Chicago, a 
public housing development on the south side of the city. I grew up in 
the shadow of that development.
  Just last week, a study was released that showed that 9 of the top 10 
poorest neighborhoods in the country were located in public housing in 
Chicago. And I know my senior Senator saw the study. It was shocking. 
Included in that number were three neighborhoods in the Robert Taylor 
Homes. That is not something to be proud of. In fact, it is 
disgraceful, and it is especially distressing to me, because I am third 
generation Chicagoan. I love the city. I know the people who live and 
work in those developments. I know they want the opportunity to get 
ahead and to have a chance to lead productive lives.
  The study that I mentioned, which was based on per capita income 
information taken from the 1990 census, underscores why I so firmly 
believe that Congress must adopt this balanced budget amendment.
  The people living in the Robert Taylor Homes and in the developments 
mentioned in that study are not better off than they were in 1969, 
which was the last time that this country had a balanced budget. In 
fact, they are worse off. They have become more isolated, and less 
connected to jobs and the American dream, less able to access and 
afford an education. They have fewer opportunities.
  Perhaps if we had been able to take the $800 million we spend each 
day on interest, and directed it instead to improve the lives of those 
residents, this situation would not seem so hopeless. But, in order to 
halt this downward spiral, we have to get our budget problems under 
control. And that is another reason I support this balanced budget 
amendment.
  Consider another set of facts. Just yesterday, the National Center 
for Children in Poverty released a study showing that a quarter, fully 
a quarter, of American children under the age of 6 were living in 
poverty in 1992. Even more shocking, nearly three out of five of those 
children had working parents. Despite the stereotypes you hear about on 
the nightly news, less than one-third of the children living in poverty 
have families that rely entirely on public assistance. The bulk of 
these children have parents who work. All of our spending has not done 
those children, or their parents--most of whom are working, scrimping 
and saving and trying to get ahead--has not done them much good. 
Without our massive deficits, if we did not have to devote such a 
substantial amount of our budget to interest on the national debt, the 
Government could help these people find better jobs. These are people 
who want to work; but, because we have gotten ourselves into such a 
hole with our lack of fiscal discipline, the Government cannot give 
them the hand that they deserve.
  I have heard many opponents of the balanced budget amendment question 
the need to tackle the deficit immediately. America is not, they 
maintain, in the midst of a budgetary crisis. In the short term--the 
next 7 years--that is perhaps true. The country can probably continue 
on its current irresponsible path for a few years into the next 
century. But, after that, it will no longer be possible to ignore the 
basic demographic and health care cost trends driving the increases in 
Federal spending. We simply will not be able to continue on our current 
path, and expect the Federal Government to function as a partner of the 
people well into the next century. And, if we wait to act until crisis 
comes, any action we take will be that much more painful, and that much 
less effective.
  Again, a quick glance at our current budget provides ample reason why 
we must act now, instead of waiting for the crisis to hit full blown. 
The entire Federal deficit for the current fiscal year--estimated at 
$176 billion--represents the interest owed on the huge national debt 
run up during the 1980's. This year, and next year, the budget would be 
balanced if not for the reckless supply-side economics that caused the 
deficit to balloon from its 1980 level of about $1 trillion to its 
current level of more than $4.7 trillion. If we had acted in 1980 to 
tackle the deficit, rather than adopting approaches that merely fed its 
rapid growth, the problems we face today--in terms of demographics, and 
the aging of the baby boomers--would seem much more manageable. In 
1980, interest on the debt was $75 billion--that is a lot of money, Mr. 
President, but it is nowhere near the $950 billion we currently pay. 
How much better off we would be if, in 1980, Congress had possessed the 
courage to make the difficult choices, and balance the budget. Not 
passing the balanced budget amendment will not make our problems go 
away. Our ability to meet our priorities will be much greater if we 
enact the balanced budget amendment now, if we tackle the tough 
problems now, instead of waiting until the country is on the brink of 
financial ruin. If we need any convincing about the need to address the 
deficit now, in 1995, we should just look at the consequences of our 
failure to address it then, in 1980.
  The Entitlements Commission concluded last December without issuing 
any specific recommendations to Congress, to the dismay of some.
 Nonetheless, I believe the Commission was a real success, for 
outlining in painstaking detail the truth about our budget future, and 
the consequences of not facing it honestly. I would also add that this 
report was adopted by a strong bipartisan vote of 30 to 1, which is 
quite remarkable, when you think of the wide variety of personalities 
and 
[[Page S1826]] viewpoints that served on the Commission. What that 
bipartisan vote told me was that all of us, Democrat and Republican 
alike, know what the problems are, and know we need to act now to get 
them under control. If nothing else, the balanced budget amendment will 
help end the conspiracy of silence surrounding our Nation's fiscal 
problems, and ensure that we no longer have the ability to ignore the 
facts that are staring us in the face. Instead, it will guarantee that 
we face those facts, sooner rather than later.
  Mr. President, given the level of public concern about our growing 
budget deficits, I was surprised that the Commission's final report did 
not receive more media attention than it did. I attribute that lack of 
interest to the difficulty of putting cold, hard, incomprehensive 
numbers into real, human terms. People hear what we are saying when we 
talk about the deficit being a certain percentage of the economy; that 
does not necessarily mean they know what the numbers actually mean.
  To paraphrase Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve System, 
it is hard to get people--or the media--interested in a problem whose 
symptoms are hard to detect and whose full-blown effects seem to be 
years or decades away.
  But the final report of the Kerrey-Danforth Commission should not be 
of interest solely to economists and policy wonks. These numbers have a 
real effect on us all. We need to communicate to ordinary Americans how 
the fiscal bottom line affects them; we have to put the sometimes 
incomprehensible into real, human terms.
  The senior Senator from Illinois, my Senator, Paul Simon--to whom the 
country owes a great debt of gratitude for championing this issue--
often refers to a study by the New York Federal Reserve Board, that 
looked at what the budget deficit cost America during a 10-year period 
from 1978 to 1988.
  According to the study, during that 10-year period, our country lost 
5 percentage points of growth due to the deficit. According to the 
Congressional Budget Office, each percentage point of growth translates 
into approximately 650,000 jobs. Let me repeat that--650,000 jobs. In 
other words, our country would have created an additional 3.75
 million jobs during that period, if not for the Federal budget 
deficit.

  Another way to make these numbers more real to ordinary Americans 
involves looking at what we spend in interest. Every dollar that the 
Federal Government spends on interest payments on the Federal debt 
squeezes out funds that could otherwise be used to increase the 
productivity of society. Currently, the Federal Government is spending 
$800 million every day for interest payments on the national debt.
  Think about that--$800 million that could otherwise be used for Head 
Start, for housing programs, for our battle against crime and drugs, to 
create jobs, or to repair our crumbling infrastructure--every day.
  In total, in 1994, we spent $203 billion to service the national 
debt--an amount equal to 14 percent of total Government outlays. We can 
not afford to waste this precious capital on financing the Government 
debt. We are, essentially, paying bond holders with money that could 
otherwise be used to help working people get ahead.
  Many opponents of the balanced budget amendment argue that Government 
should be allowed to deficit-spend in order to continue investing in 
infrastructure, jobs, education, and the like. I agree that public 
investment is a necessary and proper Government function. But I 
disagree that deficit spending is the most effective way to accomplish 
that.
  In 1966, when our deficit totaled $3.7 billion, 2.6 percent of our 
budget went toward funding long-term investment. Now, with our budget 
deficit about to hit $268 billion, our long-term investment has shrunk 
to 1.8 percent of the budget. The reason, I think, is obvious--more and 
more of our funds must be devoted to paying interest on the debt, 
leaving less and less for investment.
  There are many other negative consequences, of course, of chronic 
Government borrowing. When households and businesses have to compete 
with the Federal Government to obtain loans, the increase in demand 
pushes interest rates up.
 Government takes scarce capital that would otherwise be available to 
the private sector for job creation, investment in infrastructure, or 
even savings. Deficits have a chilling effect on private initiative. To 
quote one of our Founding Fathers, Andrew Jackson:

       Once the budget is balanced and the debts paid off, our 
     population will be relieved from a considerable portion of 
     its present burdens, and will find * * * additional means for 
     the display of individual enterprise.

  We would all do well to heed his words today.
  Mr. President, the opponents of H.J. Resolution 1 have a great many 
arguments to support their view that a balanced budget amendment is 
unwise. I do not doubt the sincerity of their opposition, for their 
ranks include a number of Senators with whom I usually find myself in 
agreement. I greatly respect their view; however, I simply cannot agree 
with them. I would like to take a minute to discuss why.
  I know I have taken a couple of minutes already. I would like to 
finish. This is such an important issue. I know the Senator from 
Louisiana is waiting, but I would like to make a complete statement 
today.
  First and foremost, opponents of House Joint Resolution 1 state that 
we should not be tinkering around with the Constitution. Well, I could 
not agree with them more. The years I spent studying law at the 
University of Chicago gave me a deep appreciation for the Constitution. 
I believe the U.S. Constitution to be the finest exposition of 
democratic principles ever written. I make that statement fully aware 
that, in its original form, the Constitution included neither African-
Americans nor women in its vision of a democratic society. But it 
changed to better realize the promise of America. The beauty of the 
Constitution is that it can, through a deliberate, cumbersome, and 
sometimes painful process, be amended to reflect the changing 
realities, and meet new challenges faced by our Nation. This current 
problem--the problem of our growing fiscal disorder--is too important 
not to act on today. Who could be opposed to affirmatively stating in 
the Constitution that current generations must act responsibly, so that 
future generations will not be forced to bear the burden of their 
irresponsibility? What could be more important than the fiscal 
integrity of our Nation? As another of our Founding Fathers, Thomas 
Jefferson once said:

       We should consider ourselves unauthorized to saddle 
     posterity with our debts, and morally bound to pay them 
     ourselves.

  Why is that proposition not important enough to be included in the 
Constitution?
  Mr. President, it is argued that matters of fiscal policy should not 
be included in the
 Constitution. I believe that proposition frankly ignores the fact that 
the Constitution deals with fiscal policy in a variety of ways. I will 
mention just a few of them here: Article 1, section 7, provides that 
all bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of 
Representatives; article 1, section 8 provides that Congress shall have 
the power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, and 
to pay the debts of the United States; it further provides that 
Congress has the power to borrow money on credit, to coin money, and to 
fix the standard of weights and measures. Section 8 includes the power 
to punish those who produce counterfeit money, to appropriate funds for 
the support of the Armed Forces, and to enact uniform laws on the 
subject of bankruptcy.

  Article 1, section 9 of the Constitution provides that no money shall 
be drawn from the Treasury but in consequence of appropriations made by 
law, and mandates that a regular statement and account of receipts and 
expenditures of all public money shall be published from time to time. 
Article 1, section 10, forbids the individual States from coining 
money. Article 6 provided that all debts contracted before the 
Constitution was adopted would be valid against the United States. 
Clearly, fiscal measures are part of the Constitutions's main text.
  Fiscal issues are also mentioned in various amendments. The 16th 
amendment, of course, grants Congress the power to collect income 
taxes. The 14th amendment, in section 4, states that neither the United 
States nor the States may assume or pay any debt incurred in aid of 
insurrection or rebellion against the United States. There 
[[Page S1827]] are other provisions I could mention, but these are 
sufficient to refute the contention of opponents of the balanced budget 
amendment, that monetary issues should not be dealt with in the 
Constitution.
  Nor do I accept the argument that budget deficits are a temporary 
problem, and will not always need to be dealt with; we should not, 
opponents argue, write into the Constitution an amendment that will 
become irrelevant and outdated once we get our current situation under 
control. Nothing would make me happier than to believe that our current 
budgetary deficits are only temporary, and are not something that 
future generations will have to contend with. That, however, Mr. 
President, is not the case. We are here today precisely because we have 
not previously had the discipline to voluntarily achieve the goals of 
House Joint Resolution 1.
  Opponents of House Joint Resolution 1 also argue that there are times 
when the Federal Government needs to run a
 budget deficit. This, of course, reflects a Keynesian notion of 
economic policy; that in times of economic downturn, the Federal 
Government must act to stimulate economic activity through deficit 
spending. To that argument, I would simply respond that House Joint 
Resolution 1 does not prevent the Government from spending its way out 
of a recession if it chooses to do so; it merely provides that three-
fifths of the Congress must affirmatively vote to do so.

  But more importantly, I would say to my colleagues that there is a 
great deal of difference between the Federal Government stimulating 
economic activity by spending during a recession, and our current 
situation. The Federal budget has not been balanced since 1969. During 
the past 25 years, we have enjoyed substantial periods of economic 
growth--our economy has not been in a recession, it has been growing, 
over most of the past 25 years. But we did not balance the budget in 
the good years either. Our current fiscal policy reflects more than 
recessionary spending; it is regular, habitual, undisciplined, deficit 
spending--and it must stop.
  Last year I had the honor of reading George Washington's ``farewell 
address to the nation'' on the floor of the Senate. This is something 
that one freshman Member a year gets a chance to do. Really, a singular 
honor. In that address, Mr. Washington left us with some words of 
wisdom that, I believe, support the notion of a balanced budget 
amendment. I would like to quote those here today:

       As a very important source of strength and security, 
     cherish public credit. One method of preserving it is to use 
     it as sparingly as possible, avoiding occasions of expense by 
     cultivating peace, but remembering, also, that timely 
     disbursements, to prepare for danger, frequently prevent much 
     greater disbursements to repel it; avoiding likewise the 
     accumulation of debt, not only by shunning occasion of 
     expense, by my vigorous exertions, in times of peace, to 
     discharge the debts which unavoidable wars may have 
     occasioned, not ungenerously throwing upon posterity the 
     burden which we ourselves ought to bear.

  These words, which are ceremoniously repeated each year in the 
Senate, underscore what the balanced budget amendment stands for: that 
borrowing money to pay the Government's debts, and running a budget 
deficit, should not be impossible, but should be an extraordinary 
event, done only when an overwhelming percentage of the Congress thinks 
it wise. While running a budget deficit may be necessary at times, it 
is not good fiscal policy to do so on a consistent basis. The
 Congressional Budget Office, the General Accounting Office, and a 
multitude of distinguished economists have all warned that our 
continued deficit spending will result in lower productivity and 
deteriorating living standards. It should require more than a simple 51 
votes to deficit spend. The three-fifth requirement reflects that 
reality.

  This is not, I might add, a subversion of the principle of majority 
rule. I do not believe in unduly restricting the ability of Congress to 
function. I would not have supported this amendment if it had, for 
instance, provided that taxes could be raised only upon a three-fifth 
vote of both Houses. But the three-fifth requirement to run a budget 
deficit really preserves the constitutional principle of no taxation 
without representation. By running budget deficits, we are saddling 
future generations, people who have no vote today, with the burden of 
paying for our inability to get our fiscal house in order. As it now 
stands, every man, woman and child now owes at least $18,000 to pay off 
the Federal debt. Without action, that number will only grow. We are 
literally borrowing from our grandchildren to pay today's expenses. 
Permission to do so ought to, in my opinion, require consensus and a 
supermajority vote.
  And it is not unprecedented. Again, there are a number of places in 
the Constitution that specifically provide for supermajority votes: 
article 1, section 3 provides for a two-third vote of Senators to 
convict in an impeachment proceeding; section 7 provides that a two-
third vote of both Houses may override a Presidential veto; article 2, 
section 2, requires the Senate to approve treaties by a two-third vote; 
and, of course, two-third of both Houses of Congress must vote to 
approve a constitutional amendment--to name just a few.
  Another argument against the balanced budget amendment is that 
Congress doesn't have to amend the Constitution to balance the budget; 
it merely needs to make the difficult choices needed to reach that 
goal. I agree. The opponents are correct on that score. But the simple 
fact of the matter is that, absent a constitutional amendment, Congress 
has not proved itself capable of making the tough choices necessary to 
get the Federal budget under control. In 1986, before I came to 
Congress, the Senate came within one vote of passing the balanced 
budget amendment. At the time, the Nation was $2 trillion in debt. Now, 
in 1995, that number is over $4.7 trillion. We had, and blew, our 
chance to resolve the issue when it was easier to resolve. We need to 
act now, before the crisis hits.
  Likewise, the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings provision, in theory, was 
supposed to balance the budget by 1991, before I even reached the 
Senate. Obviously, that never quite happened. So I would assert that 
history adequately demonstrates the fallacy of the argument that 
Congress will balance the budget absent a constitutional amendment.
  Yet another argument offered by balanced budget amendment opponents 
is that the amendment will be unenforceable. I believe that elevating 
the balanced budget requirement to constitutional status will, in and 
of itself, be enough to guarantee that the provision is upheld. Every 
single one of us in this body has taken an oath to uphold and defend 
the Constitution of the United States. The American people expect, as 
they have every right to, that the officials to whom they entrust the 
Constitution will not betray that public trust.
  Nor do I believe that the amendment will unduly involve the Federal 
judiciary in matters of fiscal policy. House Joint Resolution 1 
provides that ``the Congress shall enforce and implement this article 
by appropriate legislation * * *.'' In other words, Congress is 
directed to enact legislation to make the amendment work. That can 
include, if necessary, action to limit the remedies a court could grant 
in a case brought under the balanced budget amendment.
  In addition, courts have already developed a number of doctrines 
which will limit the type and number of lawsuits that may be brought 
under the act. First and foremost, all litigants must have standing in 
order to bring a claim. This generally requires potential plaintiffs to 
show they have suffered an injury in fact, that was caused by the 
alleged unlawful conduct, and that is redressable by the court. Courts 
have been extremely reluctant, with one or two notable exceptions, to 
confer standing to litigants based on their general status as 
taxpayers.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Will the Senator yield at that point?
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Yes.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Is not that language about the Congress acting to 
enforce the amendment by appropriate legislation identical to the 
language found in section 5 of the 14th amendment, and that has not 
prohibited the courts from issuing literally thousands upon thousands 
of orders under the 14th amendment, so why would it under this 
amendment?
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. I thank the Senator from Louisiana. He is 
correct. 
[[Page S1828]] The 14th amendment does have similar language, but I 
would point out also that in the first instance the distinction and the 
difference--I mean legislating or litigating now, but I would think, 
first, the issue of standing would matter. You have to show individual 
and direct harm to have standing in a court case brought under this 
amendment and certainly under the 14th amendment.
  The case law has evolved differently with regard to Federal 
taxpayers' rights rather than someone complaining of a violation of 
their civil rights, for example.
  In addition, the Federal courts have a longstanding practice of 
avoiding controversies that involve a political question. In 
determining what constitutes a political question, the courts will 
generally examine three factors: First, whether the issue in the case 
is one that is generally committed to other branches of government; 
second, the lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards 
for evaluating the controversy; and third, the need for a single 
pronouncement on the issue. The fact that any plaintiff which brought 
suit under the balanced budget amendment would have to overcome these 
two hurdles--the doctrine of standing, which we discussed already with 
regard to the 14th amendment, and the political question doctrine--
should be more than sufficient to limit the Federal court's involvement 
in matters of budgetary policy.
  As a matter of legislative history perhaps, we should take up at some 
other time that it is very clear it is not our intention that the 
Federal courts be involved in budgetary policy matters upon the passing 
of this amendment.
  I want to take one moment to discuss the right-to-know amendment, 
which will be offered by the distinguished minority leader, Senator 
Daschle. The Right to Know Act simply provides that Congress must give 
the States a list of how we propose to balance the budget before the 
States vote on ratification. Along with 41 of my Senate colleagues, I 
signed a letter to the majority leader, Senator Dole, urging he act to 
ensure that the American people know what is in the Federal budget, and 
what it will take to bring the budget into balance--and even more 
importantly, to keep it in balance. It seems to me that this is nothing 
more than full disclosure. The Right to Know Act provides for the same 
thing that the entitlement commission accomplished with its interim 
report--a full accounting to the American people of where we are, where 
we need to go, and how we can get there.
  There have been suggestions that adopting the Right to Know Act will 
kill the balanced budget amendment because the American public does not 
have the stomach for the tough choices we face. Frankly, I believe that 
argument does a real disservice to the American public. People want 
Congress to level with them; they are tired of the cynical 
manipulations, the smoke and mirrors, that have been used to obscure 
our fiscal disorder in the past. The people know that getting our 
fiscal house in order will not be easy, and certainly will not be 
painless, but the long term consequences of not acting are far worse 
than any short-term pain. So I support that initiative, and I will vote 
for its adoption when it is offered on the Senate floor.
  However--and I would like to make it very clear--if the Right to Know 
Act fails to be adopted, that will not mitigate my support for the 
balanced budget amendment. Opponents of the balanced budget amendment 
have had plenty of time to propose their version of what should be cut, 
and by how much, in order to balance our books. The fact is, they have 
not. I do not fault them for that, Mr. President, and I agree with them 
that the States should have as much information as possible before they 
decide to ratify this amendment; but Congress cannot accept any excuse 
for further delay on this front. The time to act is now.
  Mr. President, I have every confidence that the balanced budget 
amendment will soon be passed by the Senate. I hope that this debate, 
therefore, will serve as a ``call to arms'' for everyone who truly 
cares about the future of our country to come together and begin a 
dialog on the tough choices ahead.
  As we begin this dialog, however, it is critically important that we 
leave all choices on the table--nothing can be off limits if we truly 
want to succeed. That includes examining our tax laws; we cannot 
succeed unless tax reform is part of the agenda. We need to simplify 
the Tax Code. We need to eliminate unfair and inefficient tax breaks 
that are known as tax expenditures. After all, tax expenditures result 
in treating taxpayers with the same income differently, depending on 
whether or not they qualify for the expenditure. They are every bit as 
much a spending program as those whose funds are directly distributed 
by the U.S. Treasury. Again to quote from George Washington's farewell 
address:

       * * * It is essential that you should practically bear in 
     mind, that towards the payment of debts there must be 
     revenue; that to have revenue there must be taxes; that no 
     taxes can be devised which are not more or less inconvenient 
     and unpleasant * * *

  Fiscal honesty means we have a duty to make sure the American people 
can take a look at both sides of the Federal balance sheet, both the 
spending side and the revenue side. Building a consensus for the 
decisions necessary to balance the budget--and keep it balanced--means 
making sure the American people know what businesses and investors pays 
taxes and what does not, and why, just as much as it means knowing 
where their tax money is spent.
  We cannot expect to succeed in our task if we begin by declaring 
individual programs or tax expenditures off limits. As we move forward, 
we have to keep our eyes on the prize. The issue is not saving each and 
every individual program, but instead defining what objectives are 
important to us as a nation--and how we can most effectively accomplish 
those objectives. What is important is not which programs job training 
funds come from. What is important is that people who need job training 
assistance are able to get it, and are therefore able to get or hold 
the kinds of jobs that can help turn the American dream into an 
American reality. Likewise, we should not be concerned with who will 
administer housing grants. What is important is the goal--ensuring that 
every American has access to decent, affordable housing--and seeing 
that the goal can be achieved in the most efficient, productive manner. 
We all know that not every program administered by the Federal 
Government actually works it is no secret. By keeping everything on the 
table, we can keep our promisses and keep what works, get rid of what 
does not, and therefore devote our scarce financial resources in a more 
effective, productive manner.
  Finally, Mr. President, I would like to take head on the political 
implications of this debate, because it is an important political 
question for the Congress. I am not a signatory of the Contract With 
America. Indeed, I agree with Senator Byrd; the only contract with 
American that matters to me is the U.S. Constitution.
  But I want to be clear that this issue is not a partisan one. It 
reflects philosophical differences that have little to do with party 
lines. The senior Senator from my State of Illinois, Senator Simon, has 
been one of the chief advocates of the balanced budget amendment for 
years. Senator Simon's liberal credentials are without question. He is, 
and has always been, a Democrat--he was at one time even a candidate 
for our Presidential nomination. So this is not a Republican versus 
Democrat debate.
  Nor is this a battle of the conservatives against the liberals. I am 
proud to call myself a liberal, for the simple reason that I believe 
government has a positive and constructive role to play in promoting 
the public good. I do not believe government is the enemy of progress. 
I believe it can promote progress. In my lifetime, I have seen first 
hand the positive contributions a commitment to the American dream of 
equality and opportunity can make. I would not be here today but for 
the struggles of people of good will to make the American dream a 
reality. And it is precisely because I so value their struggles that I 
believe we must take the steps that a commitment to
 providing opportunity requires. We have a duty to use our 
decisionmaking power in a manner that preserves freedom and opportunity 
for all Americans, not only in this generation, but in generations to 
come.
  [[Page S1829]] Poor people and working people and those most in need 
of Government assistance are not helped by the deficits and out-of-
control spending habits we cannot seem to shake. It is interesting as I 
listen to the debate that swirls around the issue of the balanced 
budget amendment and Social Security, the reason that debate is so 
intense is that current recipients of Social Security--and even those 
of us in the baby boom generation who will be in that system soon--too 
soon, in the not so distant future--have an absolute expectation that 
Social Security will provide for us in our retirement. The same can not 
be said for those in our younger generations. When you speak to people 
who are my son Matthew's age, they have absolutely no faith that 
Government will be there for them when they need it, that it will help 
them enjoy retirement security or affordable health care or a high 
standard of living.
  And why should they, Mr. President? Since my son was born in 1977, we 
have never seen a balanced budget. Mat has no idea what it means to 
live under a Federal Government that spends within its means. His 
generation has heard politician after politician promise to balance the 
budget, yet has only seen the deficit skyrocket.
  That cynicism grows deeper and deeper every day, despite 
pronouncements that a brighter day is just around the corner. The fact 
is, with current budget trends, a brighter day is not around the 
corner. What lies ahead, if we fail to act, is slower economic growth, 
greater debt, fewer options and higher taxes. Generation X's pessism 
will be affirmed if we do nothing.
  The time has passed for us to realize that by failing to act, we are 
indeed making a choice--a choice that involves throwing away most of 
our options for dealing with our fiscal problems. The only way we will 
be able to turn current budget trends around is to face reality with 
the help of the balanced budget amendment.
  Every generation of Americans has been able to address and resolve 
the challenges unique to their time. That is what makes this country 
great. Our current fiscal challenges are daunting, but I am convinced 
that--with passage of the balanced budget amendment--we can save our 
ability to invest in people, and we can protect our capacity for humane 
government. Getting our fiscal house in order will give us the freedom 
to invest in people. That is what this country is all about. That is 
what this debate is all about, and I urge my colleagues to support this 
amendment.
  Several Senators addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Inhofe). The Senator from Louisiana.
  Mr. HATCH. Will the Senator yield for just one moment?
  Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I believe my colleague has not yielded the 
floor. I think my colleague from Illinois still has the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana was recognized.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, I did not want to cut off the Senator 
from Illinois. I thought she had finished her speech. Did she?
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. Senator Simon wanted to ask me a question and he 
had risen to ask me a question.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, I will yield for the purpose of Senator 
Simon asking a question.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. SIMON. I thank my colleague. First, her eloquent statement 
illustrates why I am proud to have her as a colleague in the U.S. 
Senate.
  I do not know if she is aware that Data Resources, Inc., one of the 
major econometric think tanks just a few days ago came out with a 
statement saying, and this is in line with her talking about jobs, that 
if we balance the budget by the year 2002, we will create 2.5 million 
more jobs in our country. And they also say here, by 2002, half the 
savings in our budget simulation come from lower interest costs. They 
project a 2.5-percent drop in interest rates. What that would do for 
our economy.
  Then if I may also, just while I have the floor, because she 
mentioned this, and knowing the concern that my colleague has for 
people in the Robert Taylor Homes--it is some massive housing project, 
I thought she might be interested.
  Congressman Joe Kennedy of Massachusetts, one of the cosponsors in 
the House, said in a statement a few days ago on the floor of the 
House: People come up to him and say listen, Joe, you are a liberal 
Democrat. How can you possibly be for a balanced budget amendment? Is 
it not going to cut the very programs that much of your family and 
others have stood for for generations?
  And then Joe Kennedy replies:

       I say to them that those very programs that stand up for 
     the working people, the poor and the senior citizens of this 
     country, have suffered the worst cuts over the course of the 
     last 15 or 20 years in this country as a result of budget 
     deficits. Look at the housing budget, cut by 77 percent over 
     the course of the last 15 years; look at those who have press 
     conferences who say they want to protect fuel assistance for 
     the poor. Look at what happened to the fuel assistance 
     program--cut by 30 percent.

  Then he goes on to a number of others and then this final line that 
Congressman Joe Kennedy says:

       Do we see the bellies of our poorest children filled as a 
     result of interest payments on the national debt?

  I think that is a powerful way to respond there. I really appreciate 
it.
  If my colleagues--I am not sure who I am getting yielded from----
  Ms. MOSELEY-BRAUN. I have no further comment except to say I very 
much appreciate the Senator's leadership in this, and the patience of 
my colleagues. The statement took a little longer than I expected. I 
did want to make it because this is the beginning part of what is 
probably one of the most historic debates this Congress has seen in a 
very long time.
  I feel honored to be a part of it. Again I thank the Senator for his 
leadership and I yield the floor.
  Mr. SIMON. It was an excellent statement and if I could respond to 
the question my colleague from Louisiana asked earlier about 
implementation language, he mentioned the 14th amendment.
  This amendment has two other things I think are of interest. No. 1, 
section 6 says, ``Congress shall enforce--'' and, No. 2, ``The history 
of State governments.''
  Mr. President, 48 of the 50 States have some similar provision--not 
identical but somewhat similar.
  There simply has not been a history of litigation in State courts. I 
was just looking at Colorado the other day. In the history of Colorado, 
there has not been a single court case on this.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, I yield for a unanimous-consent request 
to the Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. Can I modify that for just a bit so I can compliment the 
distinguished Senator from Illinois as well. I certainly want to 
compliment her for her strong, persuasive statement. We appreciate the 
leadership she has provided on this issue as well as others.
  I miss her on the Judiciary Committee. I want everybody to know she 
played a tremendous role there. But I thank her.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Thompson). The Senator from Louisiana.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, 3 weeks ago I rose on the floor of this 
Senate to announce I would not be running for reelection. Today I rise, 
with the luxury of not having to face another election to the U.S. 
Senate, to oppose this amendment in its present form.
  I do so, first of all, because I believe this amendment violates the 
social contract. The social contract was a concept formed in the 18th 
century by French philosophers, principally Jean Jacques Rousseau, who 
came up with this concept which in turn inspired Thomas Jefferson and 
the people who wrote the Declaration of Independence and the 
Constitution. It was founded on the thought that there should be 
government by consent of the governed. A social contract where the 
people, understanding the issues, gave to their elected officials the 
right to make decisions on their behalf.
  Why does this violate the social contract? Because we have here a pig 
in a poke in which the American public are asked, in effect, to trust 
us and we or the courts will later tell you what the program is. A 
balanced budget is not self-defining. A balanced budget can be balanced 
in many, many ways, some of 
[[Page S1830]] which are good and some of which are not so good.
  Alan Greenspan, the chairman of the Fed, was before the Budget 
Committee just last week. I asked him about various ways that the 
budget could be balanced. Some, he said, would be bad for the economy. 
Some would be good for the economy. And the fact of the matter is, we 
do not know how this budget would be balanced. It could be balanced 
through taxes, and I wonder how many of my colleagues on the other side 
of the aisle would sit still for a budget balanced solely through 
taxes? I would guess they would all oppose it. The American people 
would oppose it.
  I wonder how many on my side of the aisle would like a budget 
balanced by cuts in Social Security and Medicare; in other words, 
senior citizens programs. I suspect not that many. One reason it 
violates the social contract is that people in our country do not 
understand the budget and how it is made up.
  On Wednesday, November 16, the New York Times printed an article 
which in turn reported the results of an exit poll done by Harvard 
University and the Kaiser Family Foundation. In this poll, people were 
asked, ``What is the biggest program in the Federal budget?'' Twenty-
seven percent of the respondents said foreign aid; 19 percent said 
welfare. In other words, almost half of the people said that two of the 
really smaller programs make up the biggest part of the Federal budget. 
The fact of the matter is foreign aid is less than 1 percent of the 
budget. AFDC--otherwise called welfare--is also only little more than 1 
percent of the budget.
  As this article goes on to say, quoting from the article, it says:

       * * * the Harvard polling expert who helped conduct the 
     survey said that unless policymakers tried to educate people 
     on the budget we are going to have a heck of a time having a 
     national debate on the deficit.

  Here we are. There has been very little done to educate the public on 
what we are really talking about. The public thinks, I believe--and 
this poll indicates--that all you have to do is cut welfare and foreign 
aid and maybe waste, fraud, and abuse, and you have the problem solved. 
You do not have to deal with taxes, you do not have to deal with 
Medicare, you do not have to deal with Medicaid--all of those things.
  What would the American people do when faced with the facts? Many of 
us are trying very hard to get those facts out to the American people. 
I do not believe they are going to be as enthusiastic about this 
amendment once those facts are trotted out. Indeed, Representative 
Armey, the majority leader in the House, said, ``We cannot tell the 
American people about how we are going to balance this budget. Their 
knees would buckle.'' Can you imagine, Mr. President, the cynicism of 
saying that if we have a social contract, if we have the facts known by 
the American people, they would be against this matter, and therefore 
we cannot tell them? It is like a candidate running for office who 
says, ``Vote for me now, and I will tell you what my platform is 
later.''
  Is there anything more fundamental to the choices of America, to the 
future of America, than who pays for the balanced budget? Who pays? Mr. 
President, there are vast differences in who pays. Just in the last 
Congress this Senate went a long way toward reducing that deficit. In 
fact, both under the Bush and under the Clinton programs the budget 
deficit as a percent of the gross national product is coming down from 
5 to 2.3 percent, almost half of the deficit as a percent of gross 
national product, which is the appropriate measure to use. The deficit 
has come down by that much. But what a controversial matter that was in 
the last Congress. In fact, not one single Republican voted for the 
Clinton program because it involved taxes. It is, in fact, Mr. 
President, a fundamental choice. And the American people ought to be 
involved in that fundamental choice.
  How is it going to be done? How is it going to be balanced? Well, the 
Treasury Department was asked by the chairman of the National Governors 
Association to do a State-by-State breakdown making assumptions that 
the Contract With America would be passed and asked what the effect on 
each State would be.
  I can tell you, Mr. President, for my State of Louisiana, it showed 
that we were more heavily impacted than any other State. They concluded 
that we would have $2.1 billion per year in lost funding for Medicaid, 
$129 million per year in lost highway trust funds, $66 million per year 
in lost welfare--AFDC, that is--$444 million per year in lost funding 
for education, job training, the environment, and housing and other 
areas, and that, ``Louisiana would have to increase State taxes by 38.2 
percent across the board to make up for the loss in grants.''
  That is what the Treasury Department concluded. They were not asked 
to make that judgment for my State of Louisiana but for all States. I 
invite all Senators to look at the State-by-State breakdown and the 
assumptions that were made. Some of my colleagues in the House from my 
State when faced with these figures said, ``Oh, that is scare talk. 
That is scare talk. It is not to be.'' Mr. President, it involves 
assumptions, no doubt, and they may not be exactly accurate. I do not 
claim that they are exactly accurate. I do say that they are 
mathematically correct, that they assume that you are going to get to a 
balanced budget, and that you use today's figures about the economy.
  I can tell you this, Mr. President. No one else has put out any other 
alternative. So if this is not correct, I say to my colleagues who 
criticize the Treasury study, tell us what your program is. That is why 
we are so anxious to find out what that program is.
  I confidently predict when the word gets out there across America as 
to what this is going to mean, it is not only going to not be popular, 
but it is going to be wildly unpopular.
  I well remember the catastrophic health care debate around here 
where, to solve a problem, the American Association of Retired Persons, 
AARP, proposed a program and we adopted it in this Senate, a highly 
subsidized program for senior citizens and catastrophic health care 
under which the richest American would have to pay a maximum of $600 a 
year. We passed it, I think, unanimously, or maybe there were one or 
two votes against it; not many. And within a year, because of the 
outcry across America, both Houses repealed it in record time. That was 
$600. Mr. President, when senior citizens see the size of Medicare cuts 
that are going to be required under this, they are going to rise up as 
one.
  Social Security is not off the table here. Social Security is right 
there on the table. It is right there in the cross hairs. What everyone 
is asking by voting for the balanced budget amendment is to say, make 
us do it. We really want to cut Social Security and we want to cut 
Medicare. Make us do it so we can blame it on somebody else, the courts 
or whoever.
  Mr. President, we are told here today that there is some language in 
this amendment that prevents the courts from enforcing this amendment.
  I can not find that language. Mr. President, it permits the Congress 
to implement this amendment by appropriate legislation, which is the 
same language you have in the 14th amendment. I believe that same 
language is in the 15th amendment as well.
  Congress, as far as I can recall, never used that under the 14th 
amendment. It is permissive and it does not make any requirement. But 
we are told that there are two bases on which the Court would not get 
into this. First is that it was a political question. Mr. President, I 
think the Court has long since abandoned that political question. You 
remember the one-man-one-vote decision. That was, for many, many years 
a political question in this country. The Supreme Court refused to take 
jurisdiction, and they finally did take jurisdiction and ruled for one-
man-one-vote. I think the proclivity of the Supreme Court to avoid 
political questions has long since left, and I think properly so.
  Second, we are told there would be no standing to sue under this. If 
that is the intent of Congress, it is very easy to deprive anyone from 
access to the Court. But that is not the intent here, Mr. President. It 
is very plain. It is a constitutional amendment. There is a Federal 
statute giving jurisdiction to courts to raise constitutional 
questions. And surely somebody has a right to raise a constitutional 
question. We have that under the 14th amendment. Why would you not have 
it under this? And if there is no access to the Court, who is to 
enforce? If what we are after is some requirement from some outside 
force to make us do what we would 
[[Page S1831]] otherwise not do, if the Court cannot do it, then who 
can? Then where is the compulsion? Then what is the point?
  We can do this right now, Mr. President. If this amendment does not 
mean that the courts have jurisdiction to enforce it, it does not mean 
anything more than the present law says, because the law now says you 
must have a balanced budget.
  Mr. President, I believe that this also violates the principle of 
majority rule. By requiring 60 votes to have an unbalanced budget, you 
give enormous power to the minority. This is an old ploy, Mr. 
President. We have it in our State, where in order to raise taxes you 
must have, I believe, a two-thirds vote. And what happens when you have 
to have taxes? That one-third of holdouts have a shopping list which is 
always long, usually very expensive and, in the end, they finally get 
the votes because they have to have the revenues. But in the end, it 
amounts to bad policy. Not only does it violate the principle of 
majority rule, but it calls for making deals with the holdouts.
  Mr. President, if we get into the shape where you have to do it, 
where you have to have the 60 votes and everybody recognizes it, you 
will be able to get it done, but probably at great cost to the 
taxpayer, both in money and in bad policy.
  Mr. President, if, as I contend, the courts very plainly have 
jurisdiction here to order up a balanced budget, then how are they 
going to do it? The occupant of the chair is a lawyer of some 
distinction, and I know he has dealt with constitutional questions 
before. I believe what the Court would do is to order an income tax 
surcharge and say the Congress has X amount of time within which to 
come up with an alternative to balance the budget; otherwise, the 
surcharge will go into effect. Why do I believe that? Because the Court 
does not have access to the huge amount of staff it would take to 
determine the effect of budget cuts. It takes tremendous 
sophistication, computer models, and knowledge, to know what the spend-
out rates of various cuts would be, how they impact upon the public in 
general, and how they impact upon the budget.
  I do not believe the Court is going to get in there and say, well, we 
need to cut the National Park Service by 5 percent; we are going to 
exempt the IRS because we need those people; we are going to cut 
Medicare by X percent. One thing we found out about health care, this 
huge, growing part of the budget, is how complicated it is. The Court 
is not going to deal with those kinds of cuts. Do you think the Court 
is going to get in and say we need to cancel the remaining part of the 
B-2 bomber program, and we are going to allow the F-l6 to go forward, 
and we are going to have one less division, and we are going to close 
this many bases? They are not going to do that, Mr. President. They do 
not know how to do that. If they took 2 years within which to make a 
decision, they could never come up with that judgment.
  So what are they really going to do? If they conclude, as I believe 
they would, that you cannot get the 60 votes and that you have violated 
the balanced budget, the simple thing is an income tax surcharge. You 
do not have to know about the income tax program. You do not have to be 
an expert on that. You simply say a surcharge. All of the rules that 
are in effect right now, you let them go on, and you put a surcharge 
equal to the amount of that deficit. It may be a huge one; it may be a 
punishing kind of thing. But they would then lob the ball right back 
into the Congress.
  I sincerely believe, Mr. President, that is what the Court would do. 
I have thought about this thing a lot. That is what I would do if I 
were on the Court, because there is no other alternative. If you say 
the Court is not going to get involved in it, again, Mr. President, 
what is the point? If the Court is not going to enforce it, then it is 
up to the Congress--well, it is up to the Congress right now. So what 
does this add? I say to those who would argue with me that the Court 
has no jurisdiction; why do you not put that in the amendment? I can 
give you the language for it off the top of my head within about 10 
words: No court shall have jurisdiction to order the budget to be 
balanced.
  That is all we have to say if that is what we mean. And if it is so 
fundamental, why do we not say it? Because that is not what it means? 
Of course, it means that the Court can enforce it. If we do not know 
the answer to that fundamental question, then I say this is the most 
ambiguous constitutional amendment, perhaps, we have ever had, and 
there has been a lot of ambiguity. This particular ambiguity would be 
very easy to clear up if in fact it is ambiguous, and I believe it is.
  Mr. President, virtually everyone is for the balanced budget, but 
there are vast differences in how to do it, and there are also vast 
differences in the timing of when it is done.
  All economists--a conservative economist, a liberal economist, and 
all the rest--will agree on one thing, and that is that you ought to 
take bigger bites out of the deficit when times are good and lesser 
bites out of the deficit when times are bad. In other words, as the 
Federal Reserve Board is meeting today and tomorrow, talking about 
raising interest rates, why are they talking about raising interest 
rates and why have they raised them over these last few months? Very 
simple. Because they believe the economy is overheating. They point out 
that unemployment rates are at not historic lows, but very low rates. 
They are worried that that low unemployment will spur inflation in 
wages and in commodity prices. So the rumor is that they are going to 
raise interest rates another half, maybe three-quarters of a point.
  This would be a good time to take some big bites, therefore, out of 
the deficit. When you get into a recession, Mr. President, it is not 
the time to take big bites out of the deficit. And everybody, virtually 
all economists, agree on that. But this amendment puts you irrevocably, 
indelibly, inexorably on this glidepath--some would call it a crash 
path--to a balanced budget, without knowing how in the world we are 
going to do it.
  And it may be, Mr. President, that you will have maybe 50 Senators 
who want to raise taxes, maybe 50 Senators who want to cut Medicare, 
maybe 40 Senators who want to cut Social Security. You may not be able 
to agree, and you lateral that ball right over to the Supreme Court, 
who will decide it for us in the way that I believe they would, which 
is with an income tax surcharge.
  Mr. President, the Congress can, in fact, balance the budget right 
now or put us on the glidepath. We can do it under Gramm-Rudman and set 
forth a spending glidepath that is enforceable, that calls for 
sequestration if we violate it, that calls for 60-vote points of order 
if we violate that. That is really all we have to do. I mean, that is 
an elaborate procedure which, once agreed upon, is much more clear, 
much less ambiguous than a constitutional amendment would be, because 
you know exactly how it is to be enforced; to be enforced by 
sequestration, which exempts certain programs, and does not exempt 
other programs. And it is self-enforcing. The whole mechanism is 
enforcing.
  Now, why would we not do that? Well, it may be, Mr. President, 
because, as Mr. Armey says, the public's knees would buckle if they 
knew the truth--the public's knees would buckle if they knew the truth. 
What an incredible statement for this Congress to make; that if the 
public knew how we were going to do this thing, they would not like it 
and they would not be for it.
  What happened to that old axiom of government with the consent of the 
governed? Oh, we are told that the Congress has not done anything. Mr. 
President, where have my colleagues been these last 2 or 3 years, when 
we brought the deficit down from 5 percent to 2.3 percent of gross 
national product? Did we think we achieved that without any pain or any 
disagreement here?
  Mr. President, we achieved a lot in terms of reducing that deficit. 
It can be done. It is hard to do, of course. But it can be done. And 
the American people were involved in that. Maybe they did not like the 
way it was done. I did not like the way it was done. I had a different 
idea about how it should be done. But the majority ruled and it was 
done, and it can be done now without this constitutional amendment.
  [[Page S1832]] Mr. President, we all know that the deficit is coming 
down but that forecasts show that, in the future, the deficit is due to 
go up rapidly again because of the projected increases in medical 
programs, particularly Medicare and Medicaid.
  That means that we in the Congress are going to have to take rather 
heroic steps in order just to stay even with the board; in other words, 
to keep the deficit from going up, much less balancing the budget, we 
are going to have to take rather heroic steps.
  Now, how difficult will those steps be? I do not know, Mr. President. 
I suspect they will be rather difficult.
  But I can tell you this: that those steps, combined with an automatic 
deficit reduction down to a zero constitutional amendment, which cannot 
be avoided except by supermajorities, at least if we go into a 
recession or slowdown, might make it virtually impossible for us to 
act. In other words, we do not know what we are in for in terms of the 
coping with this Medicare problem. We just do not know.
  The difficulties we had in the last Congress in trying to figure out 
how to deal with the medical crisis in this country and how to project 
costs and how to project savings from certain steps and certain 
legislation were terribly difficult. No one could ever agree. Some said 
it was going to cost more; some said it was going to cost less.
  But we are going to have to not only do that to conquer that question 
of turning around the increase in Medicare spending, but we are going 
to have to balance the budget at the same time, no matter what.
  That is why, Mr. President, taking out the flexibility that this 
Congress ordinarily has to act by majority vote is a very, very bad 
idea. The timing is simply bad. The political timing is good.
  You know, the American people have finally woke up to the balanced 
budget issue. They seemed to be unaware of it during the 1980's when 
the debt was going from a little over $900 billion to almost $4 
trillion at the start of this administration. They seemed to be 
relatively unaware of it at that time. Now they have become aware, 
since it has come down from 5 percent of GNP down to 3.2 percent of GNP 
by the end of this year; now they are aware of it.
  It does not mean that it is not still a problem. But it does mean to 
say that political polls, as to who is for and who is against a 
balanced budget, are ephemeral gauges that go up and down and do not 
take into account that the American people do not yet know how it is 
going to be done.
  Mr. President, we ought to involve the American people in this 
biggest of all social contracts. We have heard this term ``Contract 
With America.'' It was an ingenious political device. I stand in 
admiration of it. Some parts of it I support. But it was an ingenious 
political device which conjured up the idea that the Congress and the 
American public ought to have an agenda, that they ought to vote on 
that agenda by electing their representatives, vote for what they get 
and get what they vote for. And that was brilliant.
  Mr. President, this is a bigger contract with America than that which 
is contained in the so-called Contract With America, because it 
involves the future of everyone. It is a question of who pays. It can 
be done by means testing and maybe that ought to be the way we ought to 
do it.
  Maybe we ought to say that everybody who makes over X dollars has to 
pay twice as much for their Medicare. Maybe we ought to say if you make 
over $50,000 a year, you do not get Social Security, whatever the 
formula is. Means testing is clearly one of those ways to do it. It has 
been discussed a lot.
  I wonder how many people out there in America, how many senior 
citizens, have thought about how much means testing has to be done. And 
remember catastrophic health care and the reaction to that. Or it could 
mean taxes. And we know how the American public feels about taxes. Or 
defense. You know, the American public says, ``Gosh, we need a strong 
national defense.'' Or we could eliminate some of these programs.
  But I suspect, Mr. President, that the American public is in for a 
rude awakening when they find out how little money you can get out of 
the welfare program. I think we ought to have welfare reform. But 
virtually everything that is talked about with welfare reform costs 
more money.
  Orphanages? Mr. President, what do you think orphanages would cost? 
Right now, you know, the babies stay at home with mama and you give 
mama a check. But if you had to build the orphanage, acquire the 
property and build the orphanage, get the staff to operate the 
orphanage, and not only do that but take care 24 hours a day of these 
kids in loco parentis, as we say, the cost of that, Mr. President, 
would be--maybe it would not be as expensive as Boys Town; I understand 
Boys Town costs $70,000 or $80,000 a year. They have a lot of special 
counseling there.
 But if we have just the garden variety orphanage, it will cost a lot 
more than welfare does. Job training, I am for it. But anybody who 
thinks we can have job training and then have day care for the 
mothers--and we are going to be a lot cheaper on that than the present 
welfare program--has not taken out the calculator to figure this thing 
out. There is not a lot to be saved in welfare. We need to reform it, 
but there is not a lot to be saved. There is certainly not a lot to be 
saved in foreign aid.

  I want to see my colleagues who are for cutting aid to some of our 
great friends out there--I am not--countries like Israel, which are so 
strong in promoting the American interests all throughout the Middle 
East. I am not for cutting that program. It is less than 1 percent of 
the budget.
  Mr. President, in conclusion, and I apologize for speaking so long, 
but it is an important issue. This is an issue where we need a Contract 
With America. This is an issue where we need a social contract. We need 
a major debate where the American public is told about how this will be 
done, at least what is the approach; maybe not how every dollar over a 
period of 7 years is going to be cut in every single program, but how 
is it going to be done in approach. Is it going to be a means testing 
approach? If so, what is that going to mean to those senior citizens 
out there?
  Is it going to be cuts in Medicare? For example, copayments? And how 
big would those copayments have to be? How much do we pay each time we 
go to a doctor? Should senior citizens not know that? Should they not 
know that, Mr. President? What will happen if they wake up--all the 
Senators have voted for the balanced budget amendment, and then I can 
see them. It will be just like in catastrophic health care. They will 
call up and say, ``We did not know that that is what was meant. We did 
not know, Senator, that is what you had it mind.'' I remember those 
calls on catastrophic health care.
  Now, I think the American public ought to be entitled to know what we 
are going to do, to know what the plan is and involve them in the 
debate. We do not have to rush into this thing. It is one of the most 
important debates we have ever had. Involve them in that debate. Tell 
them at least the broad outlines of what we will do, what will it cost 
Mr. or Mrs. or Ms. Senior Citizen. Do you know what I really believe? I 
really believe the senior citizens are right in the cross hairs. They 
are in the scope. They are in the sights. And get ready, senior, 
because you will have to pay for this thing. To a very large extent, it 
is our senior citizens who will pay for the balanced budget amendment.
  Medicare is going to be No. 1. Mr. President, we made cuts in 
Medicare in the past. They have not really hurt. Right now the 
Government pays about 70 percent of the doctor's bill or the hospital 
bill on the average on Medicare. But those doctors and the hospitals 
had accepted that 70 percent. What do they do? They pass it on to the 
other people. ``Cost-shifting'' it is called. Passed on. Passed on to 
those who have insurance and to those who can pay. Everybody knows that 
that is so.
  There are, however, limits to that cost shifting, I suspect, and I am 
told by experts that we are right at the limit on cost shifting. In 
other words, we start cutting Medicare just on these block cuts more 
than we have now, and we will have doctors who will refuse to treat, 
hospitals who will refuse to accept patients, and we are going to have 
to make the changes in Medicare. Copayments, increases in premiums, or 
rationing of medical care, or other means.
   [[Page S1833]] In fact, the Speaker of the House just yesterday said 
we need a fundamental reexamination of Medicare. What did he mean? What 
did he mean, Mr. President? We do not know. But I think Medicare is 
important enough to the American people that we should be told that 
fundamental thing before we go in and adopt a balanced budget amendment 
which may require that fundamental restructuring of Medicare in such a 
way that the seniors are going to have to pay for this balanced budget 
amendment.
  We are not talking about small decreases in expenditures. We are 
talking about $1.5 trillion between now and the year 2002. We are 
talking about cuts so huge that it would require a fundamental 
restructuring in Medicare, probably a fundamental restructuring in 
Social Security if those things are on the table. What else is there? 
What else is there?
  Mr. President, I oppose this balanced budget amendment, certainly in 
the form that it is now. It is a ticket to the Supreme Court with an 
order for an income tax surcharge. It is an invitation for the senior 
citizens of this country to pay for it with huge, massive cuts in 
Medicare, probably Social Security. My State of Louisiana--according to 
the Treasury Department, is going to be impacted more than anybody. 
They say it would require a tax increase of 38.2 percent across the 
board. How many people in my State, if this is true, would be for this 
38.2-percent tax increase?
  Maybe that is not so. Well, if they did not make the right 
assumptions, tell Members what the assumptions are. Tell Members what 
those assumptions are. Then, if I know how it will be done and we sort 
of have that debate out there with our people, I could well be for it, 
because everyone, including me, is certainly for the balanced budget in 
concept. But not this way. Not ``vote for me now'' and I will tell you 
what the platform is later. Not putting at risk the fundamental future 
of senior citizens in these fundamental programs that we have in this 
country. It is the wrong way to do it, Mr. President.
  I hope as this debate proceeds we will get some of these answers. How 
are we going to do it? Does the court have jurisdiction? Does anybody 
have standing? Just what is the plan? That is what we need in order to 
have a contract with America and to have a social contract with the 
people of this country.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I just want to take 5 minutes to respond 
briefly to my colleague from Louisiana, for whom I have great respect. 
As a matter of fact, I have cited Senator Johnston as an example of why 
term limits are a mistake, even though he has decided that he is going 
to leave this body.
  Just very briefly. On the question of the courts imposing taxes, 
there has only been one example of that in our history and that is the 
Jenkins case in Kansas City. That was because Congress was silent. On 
this, we say Congress shall implement, and we will spell that out. We 
will make clear this is not the jurisdiction of the courts.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Would the Senator yield at that point?
  Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I yield.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Under the 14th amendment, courts run prisons, courts 
run schools, courts have even required taxes. What was the name of the 
case where the courts required taxes to equalize taxes between school 
districts in a State? They do that all the time. Section 5 of the 14th 
amendment says that the Congress may implement this amendment by 
appropriate legislation. Same language as we have here. What is the 
difference?
  Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I think there are two differences. No 1, 
section 6, first of all, spells out ``Congress shall enforce.'' 
Congress shall enforce, not the courts shall enforce.
  Second, when we talk about equity----
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Does it say the courts may not enforce?
  Mr. SIMON. No. We say Congress shall enforce and Congress shall 
implement. But we have not in terms of equity. In terms of taxation, 
the courts may get into a school case.
  There is only one case where the courts have imposed taxes on people, 
as far as I know, in the history of our country and that is the Jenkins 
case. In the Jenkins case the law is silent. They moved into an area 
where there was no law. Here we are going to, I assume--and Senator 
Hatch and I certainly are in agreement on this, and I am sure Senator 
Johnston would be--make clear, very explicitly, this is our 
jurisdiction. And in terms of enforcement, because that is the problem, 
then, when we say we cannot increase the debt limit without a 60-
percent vote, that is very tough enforcement, as Attorney General Barr 
testified.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. May I ask my dear friend. Section 6 says, Congress 
shall enforce and implement this by appropriate legislation. It does 
not say the courts lack jurisdiction to enforce the amendment. Every 
other amendment of the Constitution, my friend would agree, can be 
enforced by the courts, can they not?
  Mr. SIMON. Yes. And we do not prohibit any kind of court involvement. 
But, the history of this in States that have these kind of provisions 
is that there have rarely been any court cases. That is the history of 
it.
  That is the history of it. The Senator and I took one oath when we 
stood down there, as the Presiding Officer did just a few weeks ago, to 
uphold and defend the Constitution. I do not think we are going to take 
that lightly.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. My friend would agree that the courts are not 
prohibited from enforcing this amendment, and that in every other 
amendment the Court has jurisdiction to enforce, and they do get 
involved in every other amendment, do they not?
  Mr. SIMON. If the Senate should say the heck with the Constitution, 
we are not going to pay any attention to this--and I cannot conceive of 
our doing that--then it is possible in some way the courts will get 
involved. But it is interesting in that last time, if I may just finish 
here, we had one of our colleagues who attacked us on the same basis, 
and then very reluctantly--and I think I speak for Senator Hatch on 
this, too--we accepted the Danforth amendment which was more precise on 
this about the courts not being involved, and then the same Senator got 
up and said I have a constitutional amendment that is meaningless. If 
my colleague from Louisiana will assure me that he will vote for the 
amendment if he gets those words in there that he would like, I am 
willing to take a look at it.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Let me ask, because it is at least as fundamental a 
question as there is here, do we agree, if I may get involved with the 
distinguished floor manager--
  Mr. SIMON. Sure. I yield time to my colleague from Utah also.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. The courts would have jurisdiction to enforce the 
amendment?
  Mr. HATCH. I do not think they do. As a matter of fact, I cannot see 
any way that the courts would find standing or justiciability, and I 
think they will invoke the political question doctrine, especially 
since we say Congress has the obligation and the right and power to 
enforce it.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Is that the clear intent of the authors, that the 
courts may not enforce it?
  Mr. HATCH. Clear intent.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Why do you not say so? It is very easy, very sparing 
words.
  Mr. HATCH. We do not because it is a true constitutional amendment 
and, frankly, there are those on the other side who I think will argue 
that the courts ought to have some control. We just want to avoid that 
particular argument.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Would not my friend agree----
  Mr. HATCH. Some say no matter what you do the courts do not have 
control but they ought to. The majority say, well, we do not want the 
courts to have any control or have any interest in this and then we 
wind up, we wind up on both sides of the issue. Frankly, what we did 
is----
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Would not my friend agree with me that this is at least 
ambiguous----
  Mr. HATCH. I do not think it is. I do not think it is when you--
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Political doctrine? The Senator remembers the one-man-
one-vote case, Baker versus Carr?
  Mr. HATCH. Sure.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. For many, many years one-man-one vote was considered by 
the Court to be a political question. 
[[Page S1834]] And the Supreme Court in Baker versus Carr changed that 
judgment and said it is no longer political; we are going to order one-
man-one-vote.
  Now, what is there inherent in this that makes it a political 
question?
  Mr. SIMON. If I may respond, on the one man-one-vote case, which grew 
out of the State of Tennessee, there was no explicit jurisdiction 
claimed solely by the legislative bodies. And here we are going to 
claim that we have the jurisdiction.
  If I may respond just to a few other points that my friend from 
Louisiana made, he said--and a lot of my colleagues will disagree with 
what I have to say here, probably including my good friend from Utah. 
The Senator said, ``This is a good time to take good bites out of the 
deficit''--I wrote down the Senator's words--talking about the Federal 
Reserve Board. But the reality is we are competing with each other 
trying to get a tax cut right now.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. The Senator is not competing with me. I think that is 
terrible policy, and I know my President is for it and I know Contract 
With America is for it. But it is absolutely the wrong time to be doing 
that.
  Mr. SIMON. I could not agree more with my friend from Louisiana, and 
if we had a constitutional amendment requiring a balanced budget, we 
would not be talking about it here. That is one of the realities.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. In the Contract With America, it has both a tax cut and 
a constitutional amendment to balance the budget.
  Mr. SIMON. If the Senator is expecting me to defend the Contract With 
America, I am not about to do that.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. No, but the Senator said we would not be talking about 
it, and they are talking about it and they are in control.
  Mr. SIMON. But my friend from Louisiana has just illustrated why we 
need the balanced budget amendment. It is absolutely ridiculous to be 
talking about a tax cut when we have these huge deficits. But we can do 
that because it is popular, and so we are going to go out and we will 
go back home and make speeches how we cut taxes--absolutely nutty to be 
doing that right now. And so I think the Senator has made the point.
  When the Senator said we can do it on our own, that is the same 
speech we heard here in 1986 when it lost by one vote in the Senate. 
The total Federal debt then was $2 trillion. Now it is $4.7 trillion. 
And if we make the mistake of turning it down again, if we have a 
chance before we have economic chaos, it will be $9 trillion and we 
will have hurt the economy much, much more.
  In terms of the Social Security trust fund, the Senator said the 
seniors are in the cross hairs--every group is being told. And those 
figures the Senator got from Treasury, they are about as inaccurate as 
any figures that I can imagine.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Where are they wrong? I hope they are wrong. Where are 
they wrong?
  Mr. SIMON. They are wrong. And I think, I might add, in the course of 
this debate the Senator will have plenty of examples of why they are 
wrong, and I am going to be one who will spell it out.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Is it the mathematics or is it the assumptions?
  Mr. SIMON. Yes. And I will spell that out. But let me just say the 
Senator mentioned seniors are in the cross hairs on Social Security. 
Bob Myers, the chief actuary for the Social Security system for 21 
years, said it is absolutely essential for the Social Security trust 
fund to pass this. Without this, we are headed toward monetizing the 
debt. And as you look at the history of nations, I think that is very, 
very clear.
  Then, finally, the Senator mentioned about responding on recessions. 
I would say there are two arguments here. One is used by Fred Bergsten, 
you probably remember, former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, who 
says we are really strapped; we cannot respond to recessions as we 
should now. What we ought to do is have a 1- or 2-percent surplus and 
then give the President the authority to initiate programs immediately 
in areas where you have unemployment above X percent.
  I think that is a very valid argument. But the National Bureau of 
Economic Research at Cambridge has issued a study by two University of 
California economists who come to this conclusion.

       Discretionary fiscal policy does not appear to have had an 
     important role in generating recoveries. Fiscal responses to 
     economic downturns have generally not occurred until real 
     activity was approximately at its trough.

  Mr. JOHNSTON. Is he one of those who disagreed that the New Deal 
helped bring us out of the Depression?
  Mr. SIMON. All I know is the economists are from the University of 
California.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. There are some people who believe in the flat Earth, 
too.
  Mr. SIMON. I would add one other point, and I think most economists 
are in agreement on this point here that they make. At least I have had 
a lot of reading on that. But the other point is where we have extended 
unemployment compensation--and I have been looking at this--when we 
have had recessions, in every case but one, in 1982, we have had way 
more than the 60 votes that this constitutional amendment would 
require.
  Anyway, I thank my colleague from Louisiana for his discussion. 
Obviously, we do slightly disagree on this constitutional amendment.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. HATCH. If the Senator will yield?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Craig). The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. We in our report make it very clear. We say:

       The committee believes that S. J. Res. 1 strikes the right 
     balance in terms of judicial review. By remaining silent 
     about judicial review in the amendment itself, its authors 
     have refused to establish congressional sanction for the 
     Federal courts to involve themselves in fundamental 
     macroeconomic and budgetary questions, while not undermining 
     their equally fundamental obligation to ``say what the law is 
     . . .'' The committee agrees with former Attorney General 
     William P. Barr who stated that there is. . . .

  And then he went on to make it clear the courts will not.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. If I may ask, is the Senator saying the Supreme Court 
is going to follow this judicial history?
  Mr. HATCH. Maybe Justice Scalia will not but the other Justices will. 
And I think even Justice Scalia will because he will consider the law 
as it exists. Because, you know, the courts can only enforce 
constitutional amendments--really only where there is ``standing.'' 
That is----
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Who decides whether there is standing?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. Let me define it. I believe my colleague has the floor but 
I am trying to respond to him. That is the ``case in controversy'' 
requirement of Article 3, which requires litigants to show harm. No one 
can show harm under Section 6 of this amendment. Since Frothingham 
versus Mellon, that was in the 1920's, the Court held that in order to 
have standing, a litigant must show particularized harm in budget and 
tax structures.
  The case that the Senator is referring to, the one man one vote case, 
is Reynolds versus Sims. In that case, in the one man one vote case, 
the Court believed that in that case, in that particular case, the 
litigant could show particularized harm so the Court did finally decide 
it on that basis.
  Now, the difference between that and here, is that there the Court 
was working on a fundamental right to vote, a fundamental right to have 
your vote weighed, a fundamental right to have your vote count. And you 
go right down the line on the fundamental right to vote.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. If the Senator will yield now----
  Mr. HATCH. If I could just add one more sentence. I just want to get 
this all out in one or two or three paragraphs.
  As an example of a consitutional situation where standing will not 
lie, litigants literally cannot sue or complain about the President's 
control over foreign policy. They just cannot. So I wanted to get that 
one point out.
  But, yes, the Court will pay attention to this. Yes, the Court will 
pay attention to section 6 of this amendment. And, yes, it is almost--I 
do not see any way that you could show standing and show that kind of 
particularized harm that you could show in Reynolds versus Sims. It was 
not hard for the Court to 
[[Page S1835]] make that transition and decide Reynolds versus Sims the 
way it did. Some may disagree with the decision. Some may say that, 
yes--as the Senator did--for a fairly long period of time they treated 
the whole issue as a political question. But there is a far greater 
difference between deciding a fundamental right like the right to vote 
and enforcing a constitutional amendment that makes it very clear that 
Congress has the power to enforce and to take care of the details of 
the amendment itself.
  Now, what is important here, in my opinion, is that--I value my 
friend from Louisiana. He knows it. We have been friends for the whole 
time I have been here. I have respected the work that he has done in 
the Senate. I hate to see him leave. And I think the Senate will be not 
as good a place once he does leave.
  But I hope the Senator will continue to discuss this with us, if not 
on the floor at least off the floor. Because I am interested in 
satisfying people around here. Our problem is, as everybody knows, that 
we have 535 Members here. If he and I could sit down and write this 
amendment it might be a little bit different. In fact, he did 
participate in helping to get us to this point on the amendment. If the 
Senator from Idaho and I sat down and wrote it, it might be a little 
bit different. The fact of the matter is, a bunch of us have sat down 
over a 12-year period and have written this and it is the best 
consensus amendment, best bipartisan amendment we can do that might 
possibly cause us to start being serious about some of the deficiencies 
of Government, which I think the distinguished Senator from Louisiana 
has outlined quite well.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, my friend has outlined the emerging 
state of the law on the question of standing to sue. The issue of 
standing to sue goes all across the law and provokes about as many 
decisions as any area of the law that I know about.
  Suffice it to say it is emerging, dynamic, and changeable. And--as is 
the question of a political question.
  In Reynolds versus Sims, and Baker versus Carr, formerly political 
questions, they changed on that issue. There they were enforcing the 
14th amendment, which said nothing about voting rights and which 
traditionally had been left to the States. So this was a change.
  This amendment specifically deals with a question of unbalanced 
budgets. My friend says no taxpayer is particularly harmed by this. You 
should have heard the eloquent speech--as maybe he did--of my colleague 
from Illinois, who talked about her child and future deficits. You 
would think, to hear that, it is the most fundamental issue for our 
progeny and our families that there is. And I believe the Court would 
find that standing to sue.
  What I find to be objectionable, among other things, I say to my 
friend, is this is deliberately ambiguous. It is deliberately ambiguous 
because there are those Senators who say the Court has to have the 
final club in the closet otherwise this does not mean anything. And 
there are others who say we do not want to get the Court mixed up in 
this because we do not want the Court to order taxes. So we leave it 
deliberately vague, ambiguous, to be decided by some future Supreme 
Court.
  I believe that is the height of irresponsibility. It is not a 
difficult task from the standpoint of statutory draftsmanship. We could 
literally draft it here within 5 minutes on the floor of the Senate. I 
would say ``No court shall have jurisdiction to enforce this 
amendment.''
  That is simple, straightforward and unambiguous. If that is what we 
mean it ought to be said. It is not one of those difficult things to 
define like ``outlays and expenditures and receipts.'' That is what I 
read from section 6 here, is that the Congress shall enforce and may--
what does it say--may define outlays and receipts? What does it say? 
``Estimates of outlays and receipts,'' define those. That is because 
they are not self-defining.
  But a jurisdiction of a court is fundamental and it is the Congress 
who needs to make that choice. Is it an enforceable amendment or not an 
enforceable amendment?
  How can we be debating something as fundamental as a balanced budget 
amendment and not know whether the Court can enforce it or not? How 
could we do that? That boggles the mind. That is the question. Can they 
enforce and how can they enforce? That is the question. We do not 
answer it.
  Mr. HATCH. Will the Senator yield?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. I believe, if my colleague looks at facts, he looks at the 
law, he looks at the Court, there is really no question that the courts 
cannot enforce this.
  Will there be----
  Mr. JOHNSTON addressed the Chair.
  Mr. HATCH. Let me just finish, if I can. The Senator seems to be 
making an argument that there is a mere possibility. I suspect we have 
to agree, there may be a mere possibility argument here.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. I think it is probable. I think it is clear.
  Mr. HATCH. The standing and political question doctrines are 
longstanding doctrines----
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Every other amendment is enforceable.
  Mr. HATCH. Not really. They are unlikely to change. In the case of 
Reynolds versus Sims, most people believe the Court made the right 
decision there. I do not know of any constitutional scholar--there may 
be some--but I do not know of any major constitutional scholar who 
would think the Court made the right decision if it interferes with 
this, nor do I know anybody on the Court who feels that way.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. Why do you not say it? I do not believe----
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. I do not believe that judgment is clear at all. I think 
it is probable that the Court can enforce this--probable.
  Reasonable minds can disagree. But why leave it deliberately vague, 
deliberately ambiguous?
  Mr. HATCH. We do not think it is ambiguous.
  Mr. JOHNSTON. I will tell you why it is left deliberately vague. 
Because there are some who are for it and some who are not for it and 
they want to leave it up in limbo.
  Mr. President, this is a Constitution we are amending. Why can we not 
say what it means?
  Mr. HATCH. Did the Senator address a question to me?
  Mr. JOHNSTON. I will close with this because I have taken too long.
  My point is that it is a Constitution we are amending. It can be 
clarified simply and clearly as to whether the Court can enforce. It is 
the most fundamental question, and we ought to decide here on the floor 
of the Senate.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I am concerned about the Senator's 
feelings. I do not see a way in the world that the Court is going to 
find standing here, or even justiciability, let alone interpret the 
political question doctrine any other way than it has through all of 
the century, two centuries, of existence. To be honest, I just do not 
see how that is going to be.
  So we are interested in continuing dialog, and I will be interested 
in chatting with my friend and seeing just what he feels on this even 
further. But to make a long story short, again this is a bipartisan 
consensus amendment.
  Is it perfect? No. But it is as close to perfect as we can make it, 
and have a two-thirds majority in each body willing to vote for it.
  The Bill of Rights does not. None of them provide for judicial 
review. They certainly do not do it explicitly. We will put it this 
way. Only where one shows standing can one litigate. In the first 
amendment cases, for instance, one cannot sue to protect the right of 
third parties. These are tough areas of the law. I think the Senator 
did well to raise this issue. It has been raised in every debate I have 
ever had on this. But I just do not see constitutional experts on his 
side of the question.
  We will certainly discuss it with him and continue this dialog 
because we do want to get a balanced budget constitutional amendment 
passed, if we can.
  Let me put into the Record at this point some answers to the 
arguments of the distinguished Senator from Louisiana on the standing, 
on the justiciability, and on the political question doctrine.
   [[Page S1836]] There being no objection, the material was ordered to 
be printed in the Record, as follows:

         Balanced Budget Amendment Judicial Enforcement Issues

       Opponents argue that enforcement of the BBA will result in 
     undue interference by the Federal Judiciary in the budget 
     process.
       Response. Opponents are incorrect. Certainly the better 
     view is that enforcement suits would be dismissed on (1) 
     standing, (2) justiciability, and (3) political question 
     grounds.
       1. Standing: The latest Supreme Court pronouncement on the 
     standing doctrine is contained in Lujan v. Defenders of 
     Wildlife, 112 S.Ct. 2130 (1992). There, the Court made clear 
     that standing is a constitutionally mandated Article III 
     prerequisite for commencing a federal action and has three 
     elements: (1) the plaintiff must have suffered an ``injury in 
     fact'' which is concrete, particularized, actual and imminent 
     and not hypethetical, (2) there must be a casual connection 
     between the injury and conduct complained of--e.g., the 
     injury must result from the actions of the complained of 
     party and not a third party, and (3) it must be likely, as 
     opposed to speculative, that the injury is ``redressable'' by 
     a favorable court decision.
       Turning to the three-part test, it is doubtful that a 
     plaintiff could demonstrate the ``injury in fact'' prong 
     because it is well settled that a mere interest in the 
     constitutionality of a law or executive action is 
     noncognizable.
       Moreover, it is doubtful that a litigant could prove that 
     the challenged law is the provision that ``unbalanced the 
     budget.'' In fact, such an allegation would be a 
     ``generalized grievance'' which the Court has found 
     noncognizable. E.g., Frothingham v. Mellon, 262 U.S. 447 
     (1923).
       As, to the third prong, ``redressability'', this prong 
     subsumes justiciability and the political question doctrine, 
     which I will discuss in a moment. Suffice it to say that as 
     to this prong it is doubtful that a judicial remedy exists 
     which would not violate the separation of powers doctrine.
       The question of standing, of course, involves both 
     taxpayers and members of Congress. With regard to Taxpayer 
     Standing specifically, the Court, in Flast v. Cohen, 392 U.S. 
     83 (1968), announced a liberalized standing test for 
     taxpayers. Under this ``double nexus'' test, taxpayer 
     standing requires that the taxpayer-plaintiff (1) challenge 
     the unconstitutionality of the law under the Taxing and 
     Spending Clause of the Constitution, and (2) demonstrate that 
     the challenged enactment exceeds specific limitations 
     contained in the Constitution. Professor Tribe had testified 
     that some taxpayers' suits to enforce the BBA would satisfy 
     this test because the proposed Amendment would be a specific 
     constitutional limitation on congressional taxing and 
     spending power. There are two counters to this argument: (1) 
     the Supreme Court has in application severely restricted the 
     Flast doctrine; indeed, the Court seems to limit Flast to 
     Establishment Clause situations. See Valley Forge Christian 
     College v. Americans United for Separation of Church & State, 
     454 U.S. 464 (1982), and (2) the Flast test is not a 
     substitute for the Lujan test; meeting the Flast test only 
     establishes the ``harmed in fact'' first prong of Lujan and 
     that the ``redessability'' prong cannot be met by taxpayer-
     plaintiffs. This conclusion is supported by the Lujan 
     decision itself, whereby taxpayer standing cases are 
     discussed in content of concrete harm.
       The final possible route to standing in cases challenging 
     the BBA, congressional standing, also seems to have little 
     chance of success. It must be pointed out that the Supreme 
     Court has never addressed the
      question of congressional standing and that the Circuit 
     courts are divided on this issue. However, the D.C. 
     Circuit recognizes congressional standing in the following 
     limited circumstances: (1) the traditional standing tests 
     of the Supreme Court are met, (2) there must be a 
     deprivation within the ``zone of interest'' protected by 
     the Constitution or a statute (generally, the right to 
     vote on a given issue or the protection of the efficacy of 
     a vote), and (3) substantial relief cannot be obtained 
     from fellow legislators through the enactment, repeal or 
     amendment of a statute (``equitable discretion'' 
     doctrine). Reigle v. Federal Open Market Committee, 656 
     F.2d 873 (D.C. Cir.), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 1082 (1981). 
     Although there is an argument to be made that in certain 
     limited circumstances (e.g., where Congress ignores the 
     three fifths vote requirement to raise the debt 
     limitations) the voting rights of legislators are 
     nullified and therefore there would be standing, the court 
     would probably invoke the equitable discretion doctrine to 
     dismiss the action. This ``legislative exhaustion'' 
     requirement apparently does not take into account 
     considerations of futility. In other circumstances 
     challenging the enforcement of spending measures, Members 
     of Congress would be subject to the same exacting 
     standards as citizens.
       Even if litigants could satisfy this standing requirement, 
     courts would very likely dismiss their actions on the grounds 
     that their claims were nonjusticiable political questions. 
     The Court is Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186 (1962), set out a 
     lengthy test to determine when courts should dismiss an 
     action on political question grounds. Since Baker, the Court 
     has narrowed the political question doctrine to two elements: 
     (1) whether there is a demonstrable commitment of the issue 
     to a coordinate political department, and (2) whether there 
     is a lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards 
     for resolving the issue (``justiciability''). See, e.g., 
     Nixon v. United States, 113 S.Ct. 732 (1993).
       Identical to the ``redressability'' issue discussed above, 
     analysis of the first prong reveals significant separation of 
     powers concerns. Any significant relief (outside of a 
     congressional standing suit for declaratory judgment) would 
     require placing the budget process under judicial 
     receivership (e.g., injunctive relief setting a pro-rata 
     budget cut or the nullification of any measure after outlays 
     exceed receipts). This relief would, of course, interfere 
     with congressional Article 1 powers. In other words, federal 
     courts may not exercise Congress' spending and taxing 
     authority, such authority being exclusively delegated to 
     Congress by the Constitution.
       Concerning the justiciabilty prong, the BBA does indeed 
     contain ``process'' standards; however, it is doubtful that 
     standing could be found to enforce such standards.
       (Judicial Taxation) Some have also raised concern that the 
     BBA would give the courts the power or authority to raise 
     taxes. This concern, I believe, relies on a recent Supreme 
     Court decision, Missouri v. Jenkins.
       In Missouri v. Jenkins, 495 U.S. 33 (1990), the Court in 
     essence approved of a lower court remedial remedy of ordering 
     local, state or county political subdivisions to raise taxes 
     to support a court ordered school desegregation order. 
     Intentional segregation, in violation of the Fourteenth 
     Amendment's Equal Protection Clause, had been found by the 
     lower court in a prior case against the school district.
       Would the balanced budget amendment allow a federal court 
     to order Congress to raise taxes to reduce the budget? The 
     answer is no. First, Jenkins is a Fourteenth Amendment case. 
     Under fourteenth Amendment jurisprudence, federal courts may 
     issue remedial relief against the States. The Fourteenth 
     Amendment does not apply to the federal government.
       Second, Congress cannot be a party-defendant. To order 
     taxes to be raised, Congress must be a named defendant.
       Presumably, suits to enforce the BBA would arise when an 
     official or agency of the Executive Branch seeks to enforce 
     or administer a statute whose funding is in question in light 
     of the BBA. See Reigle v. Federal Open Market Committee, 656 
     F.2d at 879 n.6 (``When a plaintiff alleges injury by 
     unconstitutional action taken pursuant to a statute, his 
     proper defendants are those acting under the law * * * and 
     not the legislators which enacted the statute'', citing 
     Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 175-80 (1803)). 
     That official, however, cannot be ordered to raise taxes, 
     because he or she does not have the authority to do so.
       Finally, under Section 6 of the BBA, the enforcement 
     mechanism, Congress could limit the type of relief granted by 
     federal courts to declaratory judgments and thereby limit 
     court intrusiveness into the budget process. This authority 
     arises out of Article III's delegation to Congress to define 
     and limit the jurisdiction of lower federal courts.

  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, let me also just take a few minutes on 
something that I think deserves more of a response.
  I would like to speak on an important issue in this debate. This is 
an issue which was already debated last week, and on which the Senate 
has already voted.
  Last week, amendments were offered on an unrelated bill regarding 
exemption for Social Security on the balanced budget amendment. Last 
week, the Senate voted twice on two approaches to protecting Social 
Security, and the votes were clear. It is the considered judgment of 
the Senate that we will protect Social Security from benefit cuts and 
tax increases enacted to balance the budget in any legislation 
implementing the balanced budget amendment. This body has already voted 
on that. We have ruled on that.
  This proposal, which was introduced by Senator Kempthorne, was 
supported by an overwhelming vote of 83 to 16. An amendment introduced 
by Senator Harkin, which suggested that we exempt Social Security from 
calculations for meeting the balanced budget requirement in the 
discussion itself, failed by a vote of 62 to 38. The Kempthorne 
approach, which suggested we protect Social Security from benefit cuts 
and/or tax increases in legislation implementing the balanced budget, 
is clearly the most appropriate way to protect Social Security and is 
overwhelmingly supported by this body. However, an amendment has once 
again been introduced, and probably another one of many more which 
seeks to exempt Social Security from the balanced budget amendment in 
the Constitution itself.
  Many of those who wish to exempt Social Security make the rhetorical 
point: ``We should not balance the budget on the backs of the 
elderly.'' Aside from the fact that this amendment takes the 
unprecedented step of 
[[Page S1837]] referring to a statute in the Constitution itself or 
bringing a statute into the Constitution itself, the irony is that 
exempting Social Security from the balanced budget amendment would 
create an overwhelming incentive to do just exactly that. Let me be 
clear.
  The effect of this exemption will be exactly the opposite of its 
intended objective. If that exemption is granted by this body, it would 
focus budget pressures on the Social Security trust fund that could 
destroy the viability of the Social Security Program. If balancing the 
budget will create tremendous pressure--and it will--all that pressure 
will flow through whatever escape hatch is opened in the balanced 
budget amendment. Whatever is exempted from the balanced budget rule 
will be that escape hatch. If Social Security is made the escape hatch 
by this exemption, the total force of pressure of balancing the budget 
will fall on Social Security.
  For the life of me, I cannot imagine anyone trying to protect Social 
Security trying to do it this way. There will be overwhelming pressure 
to either redefine as many Government spending programs as possible as 
``Social Security,'' endangering its original entitlement benefit 
purpose, or to literally pull the funds out of the Social Security 
trust funds to balance the budget. In fact, there would be nothing to 
stop Congress from borrowing as much money as it wanted from the Social 
Security trust fund to finance any other Government programs Congress 
wants to finance.
  How can anybody argue that we should exempt it out of the balanced 
budget amendment when 83 of us in this body voted to make sure that 
Social Security is protected in the implementing legislation? After 
all, that is why you have implementing legislation. That is why we have 
this section 6 in this amendment.

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

  To deny that would be a denigration of the whole Senate, or at least 
those 83 who voted that we will take care of it in the implementing 
legislation.
  It is a slap in the face to all of us, as though we did not mean it. 
An exemption from the balanced budget amendment says to Americans: Give 
us in Congress a loophole in the balanced budget requirement and we 
will figure out later how big that loophole will be. It says to Social 
Security recipients: Trust us in Congress not to use your Social 
Security through this loophole to fund other programs.
  I do not know about you, but I do not trust Congress if there is a 
loophole through which they can drive any kind of social spending under 
the guise that they change the definition of Social Security.
  I do not think our seniors would like it either, when they find out 
how bad it is. Does anyone believe that Congress can resist a chance to 
spend other people's money when it is given a blank check like this? 
That is why we have the debt problem we do now. If those amendments on 
Social Security, exempting Social Security, become attached in this 
amendment, that exemption would be a loophole you could drive any kind 
of spending truck you want to through. And it will not be long until 
the whole convoy of spending trucks and approaches will go right 
through that loophole. In other words, the balanced budget amendment 
would not be worth the paper it is written on. As politically 
attractive as that amendment may appear on the surface, it is 
misconceived and will serve to harm rather than help senior citizens.
  The motivation for exemptions like this is to ensure that Social 
Security benefits will not be cut. This concern is misplaced for two 
reasons.
  First, passage of the balanced budget amendment does not in any way 
mean that Social Security benefits will be reduced. It only requires 
Congress to choose among competing programs, and there are thousands of 
them in the Federal system right now that we wonderful Members of 
Congress created. And Social Security, everybody here knows, will 
compete very well.
  It will be the No. 1 Super Bowl spending victor, and there is no use 
kidding about it; everybody knows that. An approach like the Kempthorne 
amendment in the Senate, overwhelmingly approved, is the best way to 
respond to this concern. It specifically would hold Social Security 
harmless. That is, Social Security would be protected from benefit cuts 
and tax increases, enacted for the purpose of balancing the budget.
  Ironically, the proposed exemption from the balanced budget amendment 
does nothing to respond to this concern. Nothing in that amendment 
would protect Social Security recipients from either benefit cuts or 
tax increases. Those who say we are raiding the trust funds now to pay 
for the programs may be right, but exempting Social Security will only 
make that problem worse by making it the sole source of deficit 
spending. This will create a positive incentive to run a deficit in the 
Social Security trust fund, simply because you will be able to then, to 
offset revenue increases elsewhere in the budget.
  Second, the biggest threat to Social Security is our growing debt and 
concomitant interest payments. Debt-related inflation hits especially 
hard on fixed incomes, and the Government's use of capital to fund debt 
slows productivity and income growth.
  The way to protect Social Security is to support the balanced budget 
amendment and balance the budget so that the economy will grow. Senior 
citizens know this. They feel it. That is why a recent poll shows that 
an overwhelming 91.8 percent of seniors favor a balanced budget 
amendment. They want this country brought under control, too. They know 
that the viability of their Social Security depends on whether we in 
Congress can get this budget balanced. They know it is the best way to 
protect their children and grandchildren and the best way to ensure 
that runaway deficits do not lead to runaway inflation, which hurts 
those on fixed incomes the most. It is harder on them, and it is 
especially hard on them.
  Being a supporter of both the balanced budget amendment and Social 
Security, I believe this exemption that is asked for by some of our 
colleagues on the other side faces major concerns. I believe that the 
Senate has already voted on a better way to protect Social Security 
which would protect Social Security from benefit cuts and tax increases 
to balance the budget. This is the best and most appropriate way to 
protect Social Security for our seniors and our generation.
  One last thought and then I will yield the floor to my colleague from 
Nebraska. If you do not think we raid trust funds around here, just 
look at last year's so-called anticrime trust fund. I know a little bit 
about that. I was on this floor for days and weeks on that issue. I 
went over to the House to help them with their problems and help to cut 
$3 billion of pork barrel spending out of the trust fund that the House 
and conference committee had put in. We were successful.
  When it went out of the Senate, our trust fund was $22 billion. It 
was a trust fund set up to be paid for out of the reduction of 250,000 
Federal workers. The purpose of it was to fight crime. By the time it 
got to the House and by the time it got through the conference 
committee--and I was on that conference committee--it was ignored on 30 
amendments, and they had loaded up that trust fund with all kinds of 
pork barrel spending to make themselves look good. A trust fund to 
fight crime became a trust fund to spend and buy pork. If you do not 
think that will happen to Social Security, just exempt it in this 
amendment from being part of the total budget. And if anybody in this 
country believes that these two bodies here are not going to protect 
Social Security in the implementing legislation, then they have to be 
nuts. They have got to not understand basic reality in politics.
  Constitutional amendments ought to read like constitutional 
amendments. They should not be legislative vehicles to protect anybody, 
except the American taxpayers and people, which is what this amendment 
will do. It is one of the few chances we have in the history of the 
last 60 years of profligate spending to do something about it.
  This is it, folks. If we do not pass this balanced budget amendment, 
because of gimmicks like trying to exempt Social Security which, in 
turn, means the trust fund will be attacked by everybody who wants to 
spend all the time, and you cannot stop it around here, there will be a 
loophole that will make 
[[Page S1838]] the constitutional amendment worthless and meaningless, 
then we have to have rocks in our head.
  So do not let anybody be deceived by these so-called valiant attempts 
to save Social Security. I guarantee you if we do not put a balanced 
budget amendment in place, Social Security is going to be in trouble 
just like everything else in the budget, because we will not be able to 
pay for it, because these people are not going to do the things that 
have to be done to make priority choices among competing programs until 
we have this balanced budget amendment, and this is it, folks.
  This is 12 years of work; this is a bipartisan amendment. No 
Republican and no Democrat can claim total control or credit for this. 
All of us can. This is the chance to get there. If we miss this chance 
and miss this opportunity--and by no means do I think we are going to, 
because I think we will make it before the end--I shudder for the 
country and I shudder for our seniors, because they are going to be the 
people that are going to be hurt the most.
  I yield to my dear colleague from Nebraska, and I appreciate his 
patience in letting me make these points.
  Mr. EXON. Mr. President, my colleagues know that I am a long-time 
supporter of the balanced budget constitutional amendment.
  We have tried numerous other remedies, but they have failed to 
restrain our buy-now-and-pay-later habits. We have only proved how 
clever we are in creating loopholes and dodging the spending limits. I 
believe that the balanced budget amendment is our only hope; it is our 
last hope to break the cycle of runaway Federal spending.
  However, too many people deal with the balanced budget amendment in 
the abstract. They will not face up to the harsh reality that goes 
along with it. They are queasy about telling the American people about 
the sacrifices that will be involved. The real work begins after we 
pass the balanced budget amendment. Passage of the legislation is 
merely a prologue to the really tough decisions that we have to make. 
We will have to roll up our sleeves and begin in earnest to cut 
spending.
  The problem, Mr. President, is this: We have a distorted picture of 
how much is available for us to cut. I will try in these remarks to let 
the sunlight of straight talk shine in, revealing fully and honestly 
our task. It was swept under the rug in the House. We must not allow 
that to happen in the Senate.
  Mr. President, the spending pool looks much bigger and deeper than it 
really is. It would be prudent to test the waters before we dive in. It 
would be prudent for the people, their Governors, and their 
legislators, to know what is in the constitutional amendment. It is a 
far-reaching measure, and it is time we take off the blindfolds, open 
our eyes and take a look at it. We find ourselves in such difficult 
straits because so much spending is placed off-limits. The pool becomes 
smaller and smaller and shrinks and shrinks. And one program after 
another is drained into a protected reservoir, not to be cut.
  I want to take a few minutes to walk my colleagues through this 
daunting task of balancing the budget by the year 2002, the first year 
when the balanced budget amendment could take effect.
  Let us start with some reference points. The Congressional Budget 
Office estimates that the projected deficit for the year 2002 will be 
$322 billion. Under the CBO sample deficit reduction path, we would 
have to make $1.2 trillion in savings over 7 years. Setting aside 
possible debt savings, we would need to cut $259 billion in the last, 
the seventh, year.
  Total spending for the year 2002 is estimated to be $2.3 trillion. At 
first look, you might say we can certainly find $259 billion in savings 
out of that.
  The problem is that the size of the $2.3 trillion spending pool is 
very misleading. Much of it has already been spoken for.
  For example, $344 billion is reserved for interest on the debt. We 
cannot do anything about that. We certainly cannot touch that money. It 
would cause financial chaos throughout the world. So after we take that 
out, we are down to $1.9 trillion in spending. To bring us into 
balance, we would need to make a 13-percent across-the-board cut in 
spending. That does not sound too bad. But what about Social Security?
  The Social Security bill for the year 2002 runs to $481 billion. The 
Republican leadership in the House and Senate have stated that Social 
Security should not be used to balance the budget. That is a good 
argument, but, if we exclude Social Security and interest on the debt 
that I have just referenced, our spending pool from which to make cuts 
has shrunk to $1.4 trillion. To bring the budget into balance now would 
require an 18-percent across-the-board cut.
  Now, we come to a very important matter called defense, a major 
component of discretionary spending. I have expressed my concerns about 
the defense budget and the cuts that have been made and the hits that 
national defense has taken over the years. I believe that we are 
courting serious danger to national security if we cut any deeper into 
that program.
  But, for the sake of argument, let us use a ballpark estimate of the 
President's 1996 defense budget in the year 2002, about $275 billion. 
Now subtract that from our available spending pool and we are down to 
$1.2 trillion. That translates into a 22-percent across-the-board cut 
in everything else to achieve a balance.
  I am also hearing a great deal about tax cuts. That has been 
discussed on the floor this afternoon. I, too, favor cuts when we can 
afford them. But right now, our priorities should be that deficit 
reduction must come first. How can we mention tax cuts and balanced 
budget amendment in the same breath? It strikes me as the height of 
irresponsibility.
  But for a moment, let us assume that the tax cut in the House 
Contract With America is passed. In the year 2002, that represents 
$97.7 billion drain on the Treasury, further shrinking that pool that I 
have been making reference to.
  The tax cut increases the spending cut required to reach balance from 
$259 to $357 billion. We are headed in the wrong direction, Mr. 
President.
  What about the across-the-board spending cut needed to achieve a 
balanced budget? If we pass the tax cut, it climbs to an incredible 30 
percent of all remaining spending.
  I could carry this exercise even further. If veterans programs were 
taken off the table, the across-the-board cut would rise to 31 percent. 
Remove military retirement, it is up to 32 percent. Take off civilian 
retirement, it is 34 percent. Subtract Medicare, it is 50 percent. And 
so on, and so on, and so on.
  Mr. President, these are the facts. These are facts that I daresay 
few Members, if any, in the House took a look at and probably not too 
many here in the Senate have taken the time to look at them either.
  Of course, I do not believe that we will ever reach the point where 
we will have to cut 50 percent from all other programs. That is absurd. 
But it does show that if we follow this hands-off approach, a small 
number of discretionary programs are going to take a very large and 
perhaps an unfair share of the cuts.
  And what sort of programs are these that would be left for the up to 
50 percent cuts? Everything from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, 
to the Women, Infants and Children feeding program, to Head Start, to 
cancer research, to keeping open the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone 
National Parks, and all of the other programs in between.
  Mr. President, the point here is that the American people have a 
right to know what it will take to balance the budget. We should lay 
out the policies and actions that will be necessary to reach that goal 
and not hide behind some curtain and say, ``We'll tell you about it 
later.'' We should do it before we vote on this legislation.
  Mr. President, let me emphasize even further how difficult this task 
which this Senator supports is going to be.
  I am going to read a portion now, Mr. President, of a letter that was 
recently handed to me from the Communication Workers of America that I 
think is very instructive, not only for Nebraska, but the other States 
that are mentioned in the Wharton deliberations and reports, on what 
would happen to Nebraska if the balanced budget amendment to the 
Constitution would pass. The letter reads:

        [[Page S1839]] Dear Senator Exon: The Communication 
     Workers of America (CWA) urges you to reject the federal 
     balanced budget amendment, S.J. Res. 1, when this legislation 
     comes before the Senate for debate and vote.
       Enactment of this proposal would wreak havoc on the economy 
     of Nebraska, according to a study conducted by Wharton 
     Econometric Forecasting Associates (WEFA).
       The WEFA study forecasts that enactment of a balanced 
     budget amendment would cause a drop in personal income of 
     $6,900,000,000 (six billion, nine hundred million dollars) 
     among residents of Nebraska by the year 2003. This is a 
     decrease of 12.9 percent from the 1994 level.
       Similarly disturbing, a balanced budget amendment would 
     reduce employment in Nebraska by 29,300 jobs by 2003. This 
     would increase Nebraska's unemployment rate by 2.6 percent.
       The service sector of Nebraska's economy would be 
     especially hard hit, according to the WEFA study.
       On a national level, a balanced budget would bring about a 
     loss of 6,400,000 jobs by 2003. Real Gross Domestic Product 
     (GDP) would decline by 3.7 percent.
       In conclusion, the balanced budget amendment would lay 
     waste Nebraska's economy and damage America's well-being.
       CWA requests that you vote against this misguided proposal. 
     Attached is information documenting the negative effects that 
     this legislation would precipitate.

  Signed, Lou Gerber, Legislative Representative.
  And attached to that is a copy from the Wharton School, ``How a 
Federal Balanced Budget Would Affect Nebraska's Economy.''
  Behind that, after Nebraska's economy, there is a table that shows 
its similar effect on every other State in the Union.
  I ask unanimous consent that this material be printed in the Record 
at the conclusion of my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I ask further that, at the conclusion of my 
remarks, a sheet entitled ``Across the Board Spending Cuts Required to 
Achieve the Balanced Budget in 2002,'' which I referenced in my 
remarks, be printed in the Record, also.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 2.)
  Mr. EXON. Mr. President, let me comment if I can. How in the world 
could a Senator from Nebraska, after reading this work by the Wharton 
group, support a balanced budget amendment?
  Well, No. 1, I have not had a chance to study this in great detail. 
Obviously, the organization that prepared this is a well-established, 
well-known, well-respected forecasting firm. I remember using their 
material way back 20 years ago when I was Governor of Nebraska. So they 
are not a fly-by-night outfit. They have evidently done a great deal of 
study and work. I know not what assumptions, Mr. President, they made 
in preparing this material because, obviously, they had to make some.
  It is safe to say that what the Wharton people are pointing out here, 
while I do not suspect it is going to have an adverse effect on 
Nebraska to the extent that they outline, is that the constitutional 
amendment to balance the budget will cause some pain, suffering, and 
hardship in Nebraska and every other State in the Union.
  Another way of saying that, Mr. President, is we have to swallow some 
pretty sour-tasting medicine and hope that it can cure us from the 
spending spree that in the last 14 years has seen a series of 
multibillion-dollar annual deficits that are transferred at the end of 
the year over to the national debt.
  In the last 14 years, the national debt of the United States has 
grown from under $1 trillion to the present level of $4.7 trillion, and 
it is going higher. Every person in the House and every person in the 
Senate knows that. We will have to raise the debt ceiling and borrow 
more money before the end of calendar 1995. Even if we balance the 
Federal budget by passage of the constitutional amendment to balance 
the Federal budget, it is obvious, Mr. President, that from now until 
the year 2002--when we intend to reach balance--our debt is going to 
continue to rise certainly somewhere near the $7 trillion figure, 
because every projection that we have indicates that we are going to 
have multibillions of dollars in deficit for the next several years.
  I started out by saying, Mr. President, that I was for a balanced 
budget amendment. I am for a balanced budget amendment even with the 
sour medicine, even with the hurt that it is going to cause my State of 
Nebraska. I am for it so long as everyone shares and shares alike as 
reasonably as possible. Then I believe that the people of the State of 
Nebraska would say, if we are treated fairly and if we are not picked 
on, if we have to swallow this pill to straighten out the fiscal mess 
of the Federal Government, let Congress do it and get it over with. 
Let's quit passing it along each and every year, as we have been doing 
since Hector was a pup, charging it off to our children and our 
grandchildren.
  Mr. President, let me say in conclusion that I think we must do this. 
I think we must swallow the medicine. I think we must make the hard 
choices. But I think we should emphasize the people's right to know. If 
the Wharton School of Econometric Forecasts are not right, then we 
should have other people make a study as to what is right for 
Nebraska--and Iowa and North Dakota and South Dakota and Kansas and 
Colorado and California and Maine and Florida and Washington State, and 
everybody in between.
  I am rising, Mr. President, to try to set a record straight, to tell 
the truth, to emphasize once again that passing a constitutional 
amendment to balance the budget, as was done so bravely in the House of 
Representatives last week, is the easy part of the ball game. The 
nitty-gritty, the line play, is what counts. I simply say, Mr. 
President, this Senator is going to be pushing for a constitutional 
amendment to balance the budget, but at the same time I am going to be 
saying to my colleagues in the Senate on both sides of the aisle, we 
need to let the sunshine in. We need to take off the blindfolds. We 
need to tell the truth. Then and only then, do I think we would be able 
to marshal the support of the people of this country to make this work. 
Then and only then, Mr. President, can we expect the legislators of the 
50 States to take a look at this with some knowledge and decide whether 
or not they want to ratify the amendment as three-fourths of them will 
have to do before this amendment becomes part of the Constitution.
  Mr. President, I think we are on the right track. But I think the 
track should be bearing a train toward a balanced budget amendment that 
goes slow enough so that we can see the pitfalls on the side of the 
road. Mr. President, I urge support for a constitutional amendment to 
balance the budget with its pain and suffering and with its warts, so 
long as we tell the people the truth and let the sunshine in. I yield 
the floor.
                             Exhibit No. 1

          [From the Coalition for Budget Integrity, Feb. 1994]

How A Federal Balanced Budget Amendment Would Affect Nebraska's Economy


                        BBA'S IMPACT ON NEBRASKA

       10 consecutive years of reduced personal income.
       7 consecutive years of overall job loss.
       The Service Industry would be particularly hard hit, 
     suffering job losses for 9 years.
       The Finance and Banking Industry would also face 9 years of 
     job losses.
       8 years of higher than necessary unemployment rate.


  STUDY SHOWS HOW A FEDERAL BALANCED BUDGET AMENDMENT WOULD HURT EACH 
                            STATE'S ECONOMY

       The second part of a two-part study done by Wharton 
     Econometrics Forecasting Associates (WEFA) details the impact 
     of a federal balanced budget amendment on individual state 
     economies. The first part of the study, which was released on 
     Monday, February 14th, analyzed the effects of a balanced 
     budget amendment on the national economy over the next ten 
     years (1994-2003). It found that in 2003 the nation's 
     economic output would drop sharply, millions of jobs would be 
     destroyed, the unemployment rate would soar, and taxes would 
     be the highest in postwar U.S. history. In addition, state 
     and local governments would be hit hard, collecting $125.7 
     billion less in taxes in 2003 than they would without the 
     amendment.
       The second part of the study delineates even further how a 
     federal balanced budget amendment would wreak havoc on each 
     state's economy. As with the first part, the study assumes 
     the federal budget would be balanced over a six year period 
     ending in 2000 and would remain balanced thereafter. The 
     balancing would be achieved by raising one dollar in taxes 
     for every two dollars in spending cuts.
       While the exact impact would vary from state to state, all 
     states would suffer severe economic decline in 2003. Personal 
     income would be, on average, 13.5% below what it otherwise is 
     expected to be in 2003. For many states, that means a loss of 
     between $20-$100 billion in personal income in that one year 
     alone.
       [[Page S1840]] No state would be spared from serious job 
     loss. On average, in 2003 the number of jobs would drop 
     135,000 per state below what WEFA otherwise predicts without 
     a balanced budget amendment in place. For example, New York 
     would lose 140,000 jobs, Tennessee would lose 168,000 jobs, 
     Illinois would lose 190,000 jobs, Ohio would lose 232,000 
     jobs, Pennsylvania would lose 255,000 jobs, Florida would 
     lose 521,000 jobs, Texas would lose 594,000 jobs, and 
     California would see a loss of over 712,000 jobs in 2003.
       The unemployment rate would rise in each state. In some 
     states, it would climb by as much as eight percentage points 
     or more above the rate WEFA forecasts without a balanced 
     budget amendment.
       The construction industry would be hurt badly. Housing 
     starts would decline in all fifty states, in some states by 
     forty thousand units or more in 2003 alone.

                   SUMMARY OF ECONOMIC EFFECTS IN 2003                  
------------------------------------------------------------------------
                    Drop in personal       Loss of jobs                 
                         income       ---------------------  Percent of 
      State       --------------------                      unemployment
                      In        In         In        In      rate would 
                   billions   percent  thousands   percent      rise    
------------------------------------------------------------------------
AL...............    -$15.4     -12.7      -88.3      -4.4        +4.2  
AK...............      -6.4     -23.6      -93.5     -21.9        +6.4  
AZ...............     -18.2     -14.6     -130.9      -7.0        +8.8  
AR...............      -7.3     -10.3      -54.0      -4.6        +2.6  
CA...............    -148.0     -12.2     -712.5      -4.8        +5.7  
CO...............     -17.6     -13.6     -104.3      -5.4        +3.3  
CT...............     -17.9     -11.7      -63.6      -3.7        +3.5  
DE...............      -3.0     -11.3      -15.6      -3.9        +3.6  
DC...............     -18.2     -55.1     -241.8     -28.5       +13.3  
FL...............     -73.6     -14.0     -520.9      -7.1        +5.0  
GA...............     -35.2     -15.4     -312.0      -8.3        +4.8  
HI...............      -6.3     -13.9      -52.6      -8.1        +2.2  
ID...............      -4.6     -13.3      -24.8      -4.4        +3.2  
IL...............     -52.3     -11.4     -190.4      -3.1        +2.2  
IN...............     -20.0     -10.7     -108.5      -3.6        +2.1  
IA...............     -12.9     -14.5      -59.0      -4.1        +3.3  
KS...............      -9.0     -10.4      -42.5      -3.3        +2.2  
KY...............     -13.7     -11.6     -100.1      -5.4        +4.1  
LA...............     -17.7     -12.7     -121.3      -5.8        +2.9  
ME...............      -4.5     -10.3      -24.0      -3.9        +3.5  
MD...............     -30.2     -14.5     -186.4      -7.8        +4.8  
MA...............     -20.9      -8.6      -24.9      -0.8        +2.2  
MI...............     -33.2     -10.1     -152.1      -3.3        +3.0  
MN...............     -16.2      -9.7      -86.1      -3.3        +2.4  
MS...............     -10.3     -13.7      -82.7      -6.5        +3.5  
MO...............     -22.5     -12.4      -98.8      -3.6        +1.8  
MT...............      -1.9      -8.2      -11.0      -2.9        +3.2  
NE...............      -6.9     -12.9      -29.3      -3.4        +2.6  
NV...............      -7.1     -13.0      -59.0      -6.4        +7.5  
NH...............      -5.3     -12.3      -29.0      -5.4        +9.4  
NJ...............     -43.6     -11.8     -178.3      -4.5        +4.5  
NM...............      -8.0     -16.7      -80.9     -10.8        +3.0  
NY...............     -64.2      -8.0     -140.7      -1.6        +2.2  
NC...............     -32.4     -14.2     -277.0      -6.8        +3.3  
ND...............      -2.2     -11.2       -4.1      -1.3        +1.5  
OH...............     -43.4     -11.8     -231.8      -4.2        +2.4  
OK...............     -12.0     -12.0      -46.9      -3.2        +3.3  
OR...............     -21.2     -21.4     -196.9     -13.0        +7.7  
PA...............     -56.6     -12.9     -254.6      -4.5        +3.9  
RI...............      -3.7     -10.1      -15.5      -3.2        +5.8  
SC...............     -15.3     -14.2     -162.3      -8.4        +4.5  
SD...............      -2.4     -11.2      -13.5      -3.7        +1.6  
TN...............     -21.8     -13.0     -168.1      -6.2        +5.5  
TX...............     -93.6     -14.3     -593.9      -6.2        +3.2  
UT...............      -7.8     -13.9      -63.0      -6.0        +2.0  
VT...............      -1.2      -5.4       -3.9      -1.1        +0.5  
VA...............     -34.5     -13.8     -242.9      -7.0        +3.4  
WA...............     -28.5     -15.1     -208.8      -7.7        +4.5  
WV...............      -4.3      -8.0      -22.1      -2.8        +2.6  
WI...............     -18.8     -10.9     -111.7      -3.9        +2.1  
WY...............      -2.0     -13.9      -18.4      -7.5        +2.9  
------------------------------------------------------------------------

                             Exhibit No. 2
   Across-the-board spending cuts required to achieve balance in 2002

        [CBO estimates except where noted; dollars in billions].

CBO projected deficit for the year 2002.............................322
                                                               ========

Savings required to achieve balance: (CBO 1/5/95 deficit reduction 
    path):
  Policy savings (excluding tax cuts)...............................259
  Interest savings...................................................64
                                                               ________

    Total savings...................................................323
                                                               ========

Total spending for fiscal year 2002 (without offsetting receipts or 
  deposit insurance)..............................................2,298
  Exclude net interest.............................................-344
  Spending w/o interest...........................................1,954
    Percent across-the-board cut.....................................13
  Exclude Social Security..........................................-481
  Spending w/o interest and Social Security.......................1,473
    Percent across-the-board cut.....................................18
  Exclude defense (Preliminary estimate of President's FY1996 reque-275
  Spending w/o interest, Social Security and defense..............1,198
    Percent across-the-board cut.....................................22
  Assume $97.7 billion in tax cuts in 2002 (Treasury estimate) 
    increasing total policy cuts required for balance to $357 billion98
    Percent across-the-board cut.....................................30
  Exclude Veterans programs (compensation, pensions and medical care-42
  Spending w/o interest, Social Security, defense, and veterans' 
    programs with tax cuts........................................1,156
    Percent across-the-board cut.....................................31
  Exclude military retirement.......................................-41
  Spending w/o interest, Social Security, defense, veterans' programs, 
    and military retirement with tax cuts.........................1,115
    Percent across-the-board cut.....................................32
  Exclude civilian retirement.......................................-51
  Spending w/o interest, Social Security, defense, veterans' programs, 
    and all federal retirement with tax cuts......................1,065
    Percent across-the-board cut.....................................34
  Exclude Medicare.................................................-344
  Spending w/o interest, Social Security, defense, veterans' programs, 
    federal retirement and Medicare with tax cuts...................720
    Percent across-the-board cut.....................................50
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I want to thank my colleague for the lucid 
and encouraging remarks. I appreciate his leadership in working toward 
balancing the budget and standing up so much on this issue. He is a 
prime cosponsor of this amendment. That means a lot to those Members 
who have been fighting so hard to get this constitutional amendment 
passed. So I want to just personally express my regard and comments.
  Mr. EXON. I thank my friend and colleague from the great State of 
Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President I would like to respond to some of the 
remarks made earlier by our distinguished ranking member on the 
Judiciary Committee about capital budgets. The proposed exemption for 
so-called capital investments could help evade the purpose of the 
balanced budget amendment or make it substantially more difficult for 
future Congresses to make capital investments.
  I have to confess that I am not certain of the purpose of the 
amendment as it is drafted, or at least as I anticipate it to be 
drafted. It appears to be a provision at war with itself. The first 
sentence seems to encourage capital investments by taking them out of 
the balanced budget rule. But the last two sentences seem to be 
designed to discourage capital investments.
  Now, this provision opens up a loophole in the balanced budget rule 
and unduly limits Congress' ability to make capital investments. There 
would be a powerful incentive for Congress and the President to help 
balance the budget by redefining more programs as capital investments. 
A gimmick capital budget exemption could actually endanger capital 
investments as fake investments crowd out real capital investment.
  Furthermore, the 10-percent limit ties the hands of future Congresses 
that may choose among the competing programs to fund more capital 
investments than this limits allows. With the talk of a need for 
infrastructure investment by my friends on our side, I am sure they 
would want to tie Congress' hands this way. A future Congress may 
justifiably decide to make greater investments in this area.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Santorum). The Senator from Washington.
  Mr. GORTON. Mr. President, yesterday when I spoke on the subject of a 
balanced budget amendment, a vitally important subject which, without 
doubt, will occupy the next many days of debate in this U.S. Senate, I 
observed that Members' views on this subject fell into what seemed to 
be three categories.
  One category, it seemed to me, consisted of those Senators on the 
liberal side of the political divide who were essentially uninterested 
in a balanced budget, who were defenders of the status quo, whose 
observation was that their priorities had, by and large, been met by 
Congress operating the way it does without the constraints of a 
constitutional amendment inhibiting unbalanced budgets, and that they 
would forthrightly defend the status quo as being far superior to a 
constitutional amendment on a balanced budget because such a budget was 
essentially undesirable in the United States.
  The second category, which was really relatively small given our 
history, consisted of those Members who were genuinely interested in 
fiscal responsibility and in a balanced budget, but who felt it was 
wrong to lock constraints against an unbalanced budget into the 
Constitution of the United States. In that case, it was my opinion that 
the experience of the last 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, 40 years, 
showed to most the folly of such a pursuit; that neither statutes nor 
an abstract sense of fiscal responsibility ever seemed to motivate a 
sufficient majority in Congress at a sufficiently high degree of 
priority to be successful, and that that group carried a very heavy 
burden of proof as to how we could reach the goal of a balanced budget 
without changing the Constitution. And therefore this group of Senators 
would be relatively small.
  And the third group, consisting of the majority of the Senate, who 
feel that a drastic remedy is in order, who feel indeed we are in 
something of a revolution, and that in order to satisfy the demands of 
the American people we should enshrine in the Constitution a provision 
which makes it much more 
[[Page S1841]] difficult to act in a fiscally irresponsible manner, 
would of course put forward that point of view eloquently and well, I 
hope, and ultimately triumph.
  Only 24 hours have gone by during the course of this debate since I 
made those observations, and I must confess, at least if I read or hear 
those who oppose this constitutional amendment correctly, I was wrong 
about the first two groups. To the best of my knowledge, no single 
person has come into this body--no Member has come into this body, no 
matter how liberal, no matter how much in favor of an activist and 
increasing Federal Government, to state in a forthright fashion that 
that Member does not believe that a balanced budget is a particularly 
good idea, or at least a high priority. All of those who object to this 
constitutional amendment have given lip service to the proposition that 
a balanced budget is desirable, whatever their record in the past in 
voting for or against those measures, those items which would lead us 
to that end.
  So that first group, that status quo group--while I strongly suspect 
that it exists--seems, so far in this debate, unwilling to identify 
itself. We who believe a constitutional amendment to be necessary are 
challenged with the proposition that we cannot make such a request 
without coming up with a detailed roadmap as to how we are going to get 
there. In fact, it is demanded of us that we have binding legislation 
governing at least three future Congresses, stating precisely how we 
will get from this point to that without regard to changes in our 
economy, changes in our international situation, dangers in the world 
at least, or changes, for that matter, in the majority, in the 
direction of the Congress of the United States.
  Personally, I think the demand is an absurd one. It is legally 
impossible for us to bind future Congresses by a statute. We will in 
fact come up with a budget this year which will include a very fine 
downpayment toward a balanced budget, but we must recognize that future 
Congresses can take us on a different course of action, even if this 
proposal becomes a part of our Constitution. Many of those who have 
spoken against the constitutional amendment, should they come back to 
power, may very well wish to increase taxes rather than decrease 
spending in reaching that goal.
  But my point here this afternoon is just this. If in fact I was wrong 
in dividing the Members into three categories in the course of this 
debate and there are only two--those who believe the constitutional 
amendment on a balanced budget to be necessary and those who believe 
firmly and fervently that we ought to do it but ought to do it without 
a constitutional amendment--then is it not every bit the obligation of 
that second group to tell us exactly how they would reach a balanced 
budget
 day by day, year by year, item-by-item, as it is for us to favor the 
constitutional amendment to do so.

  It seems to me self-evident, if those who say the status quo is fine, 
that we must discipline ourselves to reach a balanced budget, are to 
prevail, and if they demand of those who want a constitutional 
amendment a road map, let us see their road map, too. How do opponents 
who wish to operate under the same system--under which we have operated 
throughout our entire history, and most particularly during the course 
of the last decade without coming close to balancing the budget--how do 
they propose that we do so? What reductions in spending over a 7-year 
period do they propose? What new taxes during that period of time do 
they propose? What changes in entitlements do they propose? In spite of 
their demand for that kind of detailed blueprint on our side, a map, we 
have so far received nothing but silence--lip service, statements about 
discipline, statements about what we ought to do, but not the remotest 
hint as to how a Congress, which has never been able to reach that goal 
under the present regime or in the past, can and should do so in the 
future.
  Mr. President, I do not expect this request of mine to be honored. I 
believe it to be every bit as valid--in fact, more valid than their 
demand of us--as if when a constitutional amendment passes everyone 
will be in the same boat, its proponents, its opponents, the President 
of the United States, as well as the Congress of the United States. We 
will operate under different rules and under different circumstances.
  We will be dealing with real issues, with real cuts, with real 
proposals for tax increases. But those who say we do not want to change 
the regime, we do not want to make that requirement, please vote no on 
this constitutional amendment. They, it seems to me, have an even more 
compelling, a greater, a more imperative duty, to say, if we retain the 
status quo, here is how we reach the goal we all share. That they have 
not done, Mr. President. That I will warrant they will not do, and 
their failure to do so will show the falsity, the bankruptcy of the 
demand that those who propose a constitutional amendment come up with--
that, besides a few more.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. PELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. PELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I may proceed 
as if in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  

                          ____________________