[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 105 (Wednesday, June 16, 2021)]
[House]
[Page H2822]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       THE SIREN SONG OF EARMARKS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
California (Mr. McClintock) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. McCLINTOCK. Madam Speaker, ever since the Magna Carta, it has 
been a settled principle of good governance that the power that 
appropriates public funds should not be the same power that spends 
them. This is at the heart of our Constitution, the separation of 
powers.
  Simply speaking, it is mother's rule writ large. Mother has one slice 
of pie left and two hungry sons. How does she cut the pie so that both 
brothers are satisfied? One slices, the other chooses. One brother 
cannot abuse his powers precisely because of the powers accorded to the 
other.
  And it is the same with our Constitution. One brother makes law, but 
cannot enforce it; the other enforces law, but cannot make it. One 
brother appropriates money, but cannot spend it; the other spends 
money, but cannot appropriate it.
  Now, imagine how differently mother's rule would work if the same 
brother who sliced the pie also chose his piece.
  Yet that is exactly the principle of congressional earmarks: Choosing 
the same slice of pie you have just cut or, more precisely, spending 
the same money that you have just appropriated. Nearly 1,500 earmarks, 
totaling $5.7 billion, have been dropped into the so-called 
infrastructure bill alone since a bipartisan spending frenzy revived 
this corrupt practice this year.
  This monumentally bad idea rests on two arguments. The first is that 
elected Members of Congress, and not unelected bureaucrats, should 
spend the people's money. The problem, of course, is that 
Representatives aren't elected by all the people, only by their 
distinct constituencies. Representatives are inherently biased toward 
their own districts. That is why Congress is designed to act 
collectively.
  Only the executive answers to the entire Nation and can resist the 
manifest excesses of a body controlled by 535 demanding constituencies 
and their district-focused Representatives. That is why appropriating 
money is a congressional function, and spending it is an executive one.
  The second argument is that earmarks can grease legislation by buying 
off the votes of individual Members whose judgment would otherwise 
oppose a measure. Add a few local projects for that Member, and 
suddenly a bill he would never vote for on its merits becomes a local 
imperative overriding his sound judgment.
  Please explain to me how that is a good thing.
  And if earmarks are to be handed out as a reward for voting 
legislation, Members will prudently keep a list of earmarks handy as 
the demand for vote for any bill, whether or not they already plan to 
vote for it.
  And this is not a theoretical discussion. We have learned the hard 
way what comes from breaching the Constitution's checks and balances.
  The first problem is the corrupting nature of earmarks. When we place 
the power to appropriate and the power to spend in the same hands, we 
bypass the most important check that we have against corruption.
  A local company produces a product the Pentagon neither needs nor 
wants.
  Well, what to do?
  Ingratiate yourself with the local Congressman; have him tell the 
Pentagon what it needs and who will provide it; and then reward him 
lavishly at election time and repeat. It should come as no surprise 
that many of the congressional scandals of the 1990s and 2000s arose 
from earmarks.
  Second, earmarks bypass the normal process in which projects compete 
on their merits. Worthy projects don't need earmarks if appropriations 
are spent by the executive branch, according to well-established 
competitive, open-bid procedures. Earmarks are only required to protect 
unworthy projects from merit-driven competition. And even if there is 
such a thing as a good earmark, the price invariably is logrolling all 
the bad ones.
  Third, earmarks harm the central tenet of federalism: That local 
projects should be financed by local communities, and Federal 
expenditures reserved for the Nation's general welfare.
  When a local government proposes an earmark, what is it saying?
  It is saying the project is so low on its priority list, it won't 
spend its own local taxpayers funds; but it is perfectly happy to have 
taxpayers in other communities foot the bill. The result is a grab bag 
of dubious projects that rob St. Petersburg to pay St. Paul for 
projects St. Petersburg doesn't deem worthy enough to spend its own 
funds on, and that St. Paul pays for but receives no benefit from.
  We have sung this old song many times before and it has never ended 
well.

                          ____________________