[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 124 (Thursday, September 26, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9366-S9368]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE BUDGET
Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I made a few remarks 3 or 4 days ago
talking about where we are and what we are doing, and I would like to
finish those remarks today, perhaps start on a discussion of the
American economy.
First, in less than 5 days the new fiscal year begins. That means if
you are a businessman, no matter how small or how large, you would be
closing down your books, you would be adding everything up, you would
be doing a couple of additions and subtractions, and you would find out
how well or how poorly you did--a very important event in the life of
an ongoing business.
The United States is similar except it is much bigger. Frankly, it
does not keep its books nearly as well as the small businesspeople of
America, who must keep them much better than we do because of the
Internal Revenue Service if nothing else. We are not audited by
anybody. We do ours in some strange ways.
The truth is that the year ends October 1. I think both the occupant
of the Chair and the Senator from New Mexico can remember when it was
July. We found out that was too soon in the year. If you started a year
in January, you started work, it was too quick to have everything done
in July. So we had a completed year, since I have been
[[Page S9367]]
a Senator, when we went to October. We had to fix that up. And now
October was thought to be ample time to get our work done.
Not a single appropriations bill has been sent to the President. The
last time this situation occurred, excluding last year after the
attacks, was in 1995 during the infamous Government shutdown. You
remember that, the shutdown period.
I come to the Senate because there has been a lot of talk about who
is to blame for what. Frankly, I would like to suggest that the
majority party and the majority leader bear the burden of running the
Senate. They can run it with all the laments they can put forth and all
the blame they can shed upon the situation, but the truth is, as
difficult as it is, it is their job and the first and most important
thing is that they are supposed to prepare and have a vote on a budget
resolution. While it is not everything, to many things that transpire
after it, it is a very big issue, a very big instrument.
So we find ourselves, as I indicated, where we are 5 days from the
end of the year. All of those appropriations bills that are coming
along that have not been finished pick up October 1 as the starting
date because the other ones that we put in run out. So if we do not do
something by October 1, most parts of Government will shut down.
We found that out in 1995 when there was a cleavage between the
Congress and the President. The President would not sign some bills
because he did not like certain items, and clearly he pinned the blame
on Congress for sending those bills up to him in a manner that he would
not sign and closed down the Government, one piece after another. So it
was a job that we had to get done.
I believe my friend--the new chairman of the Budget Committee who
took over in the middle of a 2-year cycle because the Democrats got one
additional Member to vote with them, so everything went to them--went
their way. I believe the answer was it was just too hard to get a
budget.
The occupant of the chair knows how difficult it was. He sat there
for days on end. But that wasn't anything new. Senators before him and
Senators after him, if we still keep a budget, will sit there for hours
on end trying to get it done. It should have been done. A budget
resolution is an important issue upon which we should focus.
It is important we in the Senate understand we did not get a budget
resolution because some thought it was not necessary. They were wrong.
Some thought we would get along without it, but they were wrong. The
American people are the ones suffering because we can't get our work
done.
I don't believe there is any room to lay blame for that on this side
of the aisle. It is that side of the aisle--the majority party of the
Senate now, this particular month--that has to bear the blame.
Back in May, the majority leader blamed the lack of a budget on an
evenly divided membership in the Senate. Early this month, the chairman
of the Democratic National Committee--who has a propensity, because he
speaks well, to put his nose in legislative business as if he were one
of us--said on the Sunday show, ``Face the Nation'':
We couldn't do it because we need 60 votes and we couldn't
get 60 votes.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. A budget resolution needs 50 votes--not 60.
The occupant of the chair, as a valued member of the Budget
Committee, knows that. Every Senator knows that. There are many votes
that are 60 votes because you did not get a budget resolution--because
the law says you are punished in some instances. Some things can't get
passed with a majority, even though we require a majority. That the
budget laws say without the budget, you have to have 60 votes, but not
to pass it.
The budget should have been passed. We should have gone back to it on
a number of occasions, and it should have been done.
Finally, just last week the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee,
referring to an amendment that was voted on by the Senate on June 20,
clearly implying it was the Senate budget, literally said here on the
floor, and I quote:
We got 59 votes for that proposal on a bipartisan basis. We
needed a supermajority of 60.
That is wrong. You needed 60 votes. Because you didn't have a budget
which did not permit you to do what he was suggesting, we didn't get 60
votes.
So that ought to be corrected. Everybody should know the fact we did
not have a budget caused it; not that we were voting on a budget that
needed 60 votes.
I want to be very clear. We have not voted on a budget resolution in
the Senate this year. This will be the first time the Budget Act in its
life--which, incidentally, is not a very long life. It is only 27 years
old. That means Senator Domenici could have been here for its entire
life. I have been. I could have been on the committee for its entire
life. I was. I could have been the chairman for \1/2\ of its time in
existence. I was--maybe 2 years less than \1/2\.
In any event, we split it when we were controlling the Senate. That
is who deemed that.
There has not been a budget resolution brought before the Senate to
be debated on the floor this year. The chairman of the Budget Committee
knows this, and he knows the majority leader knows this, and to even
hint we would have considered a budget but didn't pass it is not so.
We have now learned--and I hope they have learned--that if the
Democrats are still in control next year, which I doubt--but if they
are, we should have learned you had better bring it up, even if you are
one or two votes short. And you had better spend 2 weeks debating and
see what happens. At least you will have tried, and you might be
surprised. Somebody around who would rather there not be a budget would
say I will vote to report it out.
I have been, as I indicated, on the Budget Committee since its
beginning in the 94th Congress. I have been honored to serve on it. I
am very embarrassed by what is happening to it because it is getting
very close to becoming something we use as an instrument to require 60
votes for certain things we do and don't do. But as far as it being the
policy determiner we expected, it is beginning to fall apart as we
speak and as we vote. I know what a budget is. I think I know what we
should have done.
Just last week the Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, referring
to an amendment that was voted on in the Senate on June 20, clearly
implying that it was a Senate budget, literally said here on the floor
and I quote: ``. . . we got 59 votes for that proposal on a bipartisan
basis. We needed a supermajority, which is 60.''
Mr. President, let me be as clear as I can possibly be--we have not
voted on a budget resolution in the Senate this year. This will be the
first time in the Budget Act's nearly 27 year history that the Senate
has not adopted a budget blueprint.
No budget resolution has ever been brought to the Senate floor to be
debated and voted on this year. The Chairman of the Budget Committee
knows this, the Majority Leader knows this, and to even hint that we
have considered a budget, is an absolute insult to those of us that
have worked to make the budget process a functioning part of the fiscal
decisionmaking mechanism here in the Senate.
I think I know what a budget is, and let me assure those who may
care, it does not take 60 votes to adopt a budget in the Senate.
Despite what the Majority Leader, the current Chairman, or the
Democratic National Committee Chairman says.
In fact, of those nearly 32 budget conference resolutions the Senate
has adopted over the years, almost half, fourteen, were adopted with
less than 60 votes.
And last year, as Chairman of the Budget Committee, in an evenly
divided Senate, I had considered and we adopted a budget resolution for
FY 2002. It was tough but we worked hard and in that evenly divided
Senate, the Senate passed its budget blueprint by a vote of 65-35.
So let us be clear, it does not take 60 votes to adopt a budget.
So what other excuse is given for not adopting a congressional budget
this year?
Unbelievable, the Chairman of the Budget Committee comes to the floor
and says because the House of Representatives adopted a budget that
used OMB assumptions or did not make 10 year estimates, that it was
impossible for the Senate to adopt a budget.
[[Page S9368]]
Mr. President, to blame somehow the House of Representatives for
adopting their own budget resolution as the reason why the Senate did
not consider its own, simply defies logic.
That is why the Budget Act created a concurrent resolution, that is
why the Budget Act established a conference on a House-passed and
Senate-passed budget resolution. I have been in many conferences on
budget resolutions, and they were tough, but the fact that I knew they
were going to be tough, never stopped me from doing my job as Chairman
of the Budget Committee, and again the Senate has always adopted a
budget resolution.
So what other excuse is made for the Senate not acting on a budget?
The President's budget submitted way back in February is the other
excuse for us not acting here in the Senate.
This has to be the weakest of all excuses. This is not the
President's budget we are expected to adopt. This is not the
President's budget resolution. This is the ``congressional budget.''
We are an equal branch of government in this balancing act between
the Executive and the Legislative over fiscal policy.
I have never been shy about expressing differences with Presidents of
either party over the years when I though their budget proposals needed
modifications. The same holds true for President Bush's executive
budget plan transmitted to Congress last February.
But I have always guarded the congressional prerogative to produce a
``congressional budget.'' This is our responsibility under the Budget
Act and I would also go so far as to say, under the Constitution.
Because the President has a budget plan that might differ from one that
Congress might produce, is certainly no reason for the Congress not to
act. In fact, I would argue it is a reason for the Congress to act.
I do not think it should be any surprise that we begin a new fiscal
year with no appropriation bills at the President's desk to sign. The
failure of this Senate to consider and act on a budget blueprint, to
sit down and tough it out back in the spring, has made the
appropriation process stumble and fall this year.
Last year in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, Congress also
did not have any regular appropriation bills enacted before the
beginning of this fiscal year. This was understandable under the
circumstances.
But I contend the major reason the appropriation process has failed
this year, is because we were not willing to adopt a budget resolution.
You have to go back to 1996 to find the last time no appropriations
were enacted before the beginning of the fiscal year. A time under
President Clinton and the infamous 26 days of government shut-down and
14 continuing resolutions.
No, there is no other way to say it and it is tough. This Majority
Leader and this Chairman of the Budget Committee and this Senate failed
in their one basic responsibility under the Budget Act--produce a
budget resolution. And now everybody else is to blame but ourselves. I
think those who take the time to understand what is going on here can
see the hypocrisy of the Majority Leader and Chairman's statements.
____________________