“Not a Thing” Seven Legal Reasons the Federal “Debt Ceiling” is Null & Void

The article analyzes the structure of the US federal budget, the main sources of revenues, expenditures (annually revised discretionary spendings, mandatory financing of the main social and a number of critical areas of government activity, interest debt payments), factors affecting their dynamics. A special place is occupied by the analysis of the national (sovereign) debt of the United States, which includes two types of debt: the government’s debt to buyers of its securities (American individuals and legal entities, the Federal Reserve System, international investors, foreign governments) and the so-called intragovernmental debt. The article raises the question of where the "red line" is when the growing debt becomes dangerous for the United States. However, the article lists factors that mitigate the sovereign debt problem for the United States. Much attention is paid to the challenges that the administration of J. Biden and the Congress of the current and future convocations will have to face. In particular, in the short term, this is the need to reduce the budget deficit, to extend a number of social programs that are about to expire, but above all to resolve the debt ceiling issues. The paradoxes of decision-making in the budget process concerning the debt ceiling are considered. The points of view of experts are presented, arguing the need for refusal and preservation of the legislative codification of the debt ceiling. In the long term, the United States will face challenges such as a growing debt burden, the need to reform the budgetary decision-making process. The Congress will have to worry about how to defuse the time bomb laid down in a number of mandatory budget programs.

Obama in Question

As part of his State of the Union address delivered on February 12, 2013, President Obama reported to Congress that the “state of our union is stronger.” Stronger, of course, is a relative term. He noted the nation's progress with respect to its military exposure and on the economic front. Even so, President Obama acknowledged that there is a lot of work to be done. He stressed that our attention must focus on making decisions regarding the country's budget and singled out medical research as one of the national priorities that would be devastated should the sudden, harsh, and arbitrary budget cuts take place in the form of “sequestration.” Understandably, academic geriatricians are particularly anxious to see the uncertainty surrounding the federal budget resolved in a manner that avoids crippling the National Institutes of Health (NIH), part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. A recent study reported on the development of academic geriatric medicine in the United States.1 The study reported on the period from 2005 to 2010 and had an interesting finding.1 Although medical students are now more exposed to a geriatrics curriculum than in the past, this trend has not translated into more academic geriatricians pursuing research careers.1 One reason that may explain this unfortunate trend is the fierce competition for NIH dollars and the low success rates for grant mechanisms that have followed. The upcoming 2013 American Geriatrics Society Annual Scientific Meeting, to be held in Grapevine, Texas, this May, is a prime example of how many of our colleagues the potential drastic cuts to the NIH budget will affect. These large forums represent an efficient manner by which investigators come together and present the latest information on clinical care, research on aging, and innovative models of care delivery. Academic geriatricians often fund their research projects directly or indirectly from the NIH. These research dollars are becoming harder to obtain, and as a result, many significant and innovative applications fall by the wayside. It is worri-some to think what would become of the advancement of science should significant cuts to the NIH budget be implemented. It is equally worrisome to think what would become of the pure academic geriatrician should funding dollars dry up. It is important for the geriatrics community to become familiar with and engaged in the budget process that will take place in the next few months. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is a nonpartisan entity that provides analysis to the U.S. Congress. In its February 2013 report, the CBO lists three budget matters that our leaders in Washington, District of Columbia, will need to address.2 The first is the automatic spending cuts as part of the sequestration scheduled to be implemented in the beginning of March; if this happens, funding for many government activities will be reduced by 5% or more. The second is the expiration of a continuing resolution in late March; if no additional appropriations are provided for, nonessential functions of the government will be at risk. The third is the statutory limit on the federal debt that will go into effect in mid-May; to avoid default on government obligations, the debt limit will need to be addressed.2 It is an interesting time for our country. Normally, it may seem that the work in Washington has little influence on your personal life. The purpose of this letter is to communicate the contrary. It is important for individuals in the geriatrics community to be actively engaged with their lawmakers and voice their concerns regarding the above-mentioned budget challenges. Federal support for the NIH is at issue, and so might be the future of the academic geriatrician. Speak now. Conflict of Interest: The editor in chief has reviewed the conflict of interest checklist provided by the authors and has determined that the authors have no financial or any other kind of personal conflicts with this paper. Author Contributions: Both authors contributed significantly to the research and writing of this paper. Sponsor's Role: None.

The Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, the landmark piece of legislation that created the congressional process, is now more than 20 years old. The process has undergone substantial revisions since its inception, largely the result of a change in the focus of the process from priority setting to controlling the size of the federal and federal deficits. Many of these changes have had consequences (some of them unanticipated) that have fundamentally changed federal policy making. In this article, I review the original purposes of the Budget Act and discuss how intentional and unintentional changes have affected its role in the policy-making system. I concentrate on three aspects of these changes - the unanticipated importance of reconciliation as a device for centralizing authority in the Congress and promoting major policy shifts, the change from a norm of budgetary neutrality to one of policy bias, and the increasing use of information for enforcement purposes - what I call the ascendancy of scorekeeping - sometimes contributing to distorted policy outcomes. The Congressional Budget Process - Original and Subsequent Aims The process of developing a was relatively uncoordinated in both the legislative and executive branches before 1921, when the Budget and Accounting Act made the President a central player in the process by requiring that he submit a unified to the Congress. This gave the executive branch the responsibility for defining the structure and the details of the federal budget. Prior to the passage of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (c)urious and uncoordinated legislative procedures hid the implicit tradeoffs involved in fiscal legislation from both the Congress and the public, and there was a chronic failure to consider revenues and expenditures in relation to each (Stith, 1988; 515). Early each year, the President proposed a budget, which was considered by the Congress, primarily through the fragmented or uncoordinated committee process. The congressional budget was the cumulative (and somewhat accidental) result of legislation affecting annual discretionary appropriations, mandatory programs, and revenues. The Congress never examined or voted on overall spending or revenues or the appropriate stance of fiscal policy. Many members of Congress and observers of congressional budgeting were concerned that this failure to consider the whole was leading to irresponsible results, particularly given the increase in the proportion of the financed outside of the appropriations process - so-called backdoor spending. Irresponsible or not, however, members of Congress generally agreed that this piecemeal approach to the constrained Congress's ability to make comprehensive policy. At the same time, Congress was faced with a fundamental challenge to its spending priorities when President Nixon refused to spend funds appropriated by Congress for programs with which he did not agree. These concerns prompted Congress in 1973 to create the Joint Study Committee on Budget Control. This process ultimately resulted in the enactment of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974. The act created a process by which decisions could made comprehensively and could protected from the normal parliamentary hurdles faced by other legislation. The process was neutral as to outcomes but could be deployed in favor of higher or lower spending, bigger or smaller deficits (Schick, 1980; 73). Although some members of Congress voted for the subsequent Congressional Budget Act because they believed that it would control spending or the deficit (some subsequent evaluations [Fisher, 1985] have deemed it a failure because it has not), the act itself contained no provisions which biased it one way or the other. It would have been biased, for example, if it had required supermajorities (such as two-thirds of the members in each house) to enact a tax increase. …

Effects of Budget Resolution Remain Uncertain

THE CALIFORNIA Journal of Politics & Policy Volume 2, Issue 3 Lessons for California from the History of Fiscal Constitutions Isabel Rodriguez-Tejedo University of Navarra John Joseph Wallis University of Maryland Abstract California continues to undergo a series of budget crises. This paper examines the evolution of fiscal provisions in state constitutions over time, as well as in Califor- nia. The evolution of fiscal provisions across the states shows an evolution from debt restrictions to balanced budget amendments to rainy day funds and tax and expenditure limits. California shows the same pattern. We suggest that many of the constitutional changes are responses to the previous constitutional change, which is why a definite pattern emerges. We end by suggesting that California return to the intent of the original 1849 debt restriction and require voters to actually raise taxes when they authorize new borrowing. Keywords: constitutions, state government, fiscal constitutions, debt limitations, balanced budget, rainy day funds, TELs www.bepress.com/cjpp

Budgeting in the federal government recently imploded. The competing parties played repeated games of chicken in which they set short‐term budget deadlines and established automatic procedures in hopes of outmaneuvering their opponents. They went to the brink of defaulting on the government's debt, and then shut down the government. This article recounts the history of this implosion and discusses what might have caused it. Budgeting's decline was certainly driven by partisan conflict. Yet budgeting's decline was also due to a dumbing down of aspirations for the process. Ironically, budget hawks contributed substantially to this when they endorsed “action‐forcing mechanisms” that they hoped would constitute “credible commitments” to adopt sustainable budgetary policies. Even if their aspirations were partially realized, their logic was flawed and the collateral damage was substantial. “Obama, Congress Must Reach Deal On Budget By March 1, And Then April 1, And Then April 20, And Then April 28, And Then May 1, And Then Twice A Week For Next Four Years”–Headline in The Onion, February 27, 2013 “So we're going to hit the debt ceiling then go off the fiscal cliff. I assume an anvil lands on us after that.”–@pourmecoffee, December 26, 2012

On Monday, May 16, 2011, the United States reached the current statutory limit on the federal government’s borrowing power, the debt limit or debt ceiling, of $14.294 trillion. In theory, reaching the debt limit constrains the Treasury’s regular methods of financing federal activities or meeting government obligations. Treasury cannot issue new debt to manage short-term cash flows or to finance an annual deficit if such new borrowing causes the debt to exceed the statutory limit. Many fear though that Congress’s immediate failure to raise the debt ceiling will rattle the bond market, drive up interest rates, and possibly lead to the United States defaulting on its debt. While the United States should not default on its debt, neither should Congress raise the debt ceiling without addressing the problem that created the debt: excessive spending. In exchange for raising the debt ceiling, Congress should put in place a credible plan that reduces future government spending and adopts institutional reforms for the federal budget process.

In 2011, the debt-ceiling crisis led several commentators to argue that the Public Debt Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment authorized the President to continue borrowing money on the credit of the United States, even in excess of the statutory debt ceiling. In response, many scholars argued that the Clause would not authorize such action but, at most, would require the President to prioritize the spending necessary to repay the public debt. The suggestion that the Public Debt Clause imposes spending priorities prompts a broader inquiry: Do other constitutional provisions establish additional spending priorities that would more extensively govern presidential authority in case of an unfinanced budget deficit? In this essay, I will explore this question and offer a tentative, affirmative answer. Several provisions of the Constitution, including Article IV’s Invasion and Domestic Violence Clauses, the Bill of Rights, as well as the Public Debt Clause, require the United States, and the President thereof, to spend money for various purposes, including (1) to maintain the functional existence of the Union and the states, (2) to preserve their republican character, and (3) to secure certain rights to individuals, including all federal criminal defendants, some federal civil litigants, and all federal public creditors, defined broadly to include beneficiaries of some entitlement programs. These constitutional duties require the President to prioritize those expenditures. The extent of these constitutional priorities would, in the aggregate, not merely limit, but extensively eliminate, presidential discretion in the event of an unfinanced budget deficit.

This commentary discusses the political and practical obstacles over the next 4 years on the “road to health care reform” and describes how physicians in the United States can chart a path to a bet...

Puerto Rico Debt Crisis: Trying to Reconcile Sanchez-Valle with the Puerto Rico Bankruptcy SCOTUS Opinions: Some Preliminary Thoughts

This Note examines the constitutionality of the legislative veto provision (section 1013(b)) in the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act, and discusses section 1013(b)'s and Title X's severability from the Act. Part I demonstrates that Chadha invalidates section 1013(b). Part II outlines the traditional severability doctrine. Part III proposes a refined model of the severability doctrine with which to resolve severability conflicts involving legislative veto provisions. Part IV applies the proposed severability model to the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act, and concludes that section 1O13(b)'s unconstitutionality requires that the entire Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act fall.

The Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act was passed 50 years ago to put the Congress on a more equal footing with the President. The law has controlled Presidential impoundments, but the budget process has gotten less timely. It has enabled the Congress to articulate a different fiscal path than the President, but the budget resolution has degenerated into a vehicle for political messaging. Its most significant results have been the use of reconciliation for major policy changes and the establishment and ascendency of the Congressional Budget Office as the main source of credible information on the federal budget.

The United States is the only Western, industrialized nation still executing criminal offenders. The Constitutional provision that is most often used to call the appropriateness of capital punishment in the United States into question is the 8th Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. Opponents of capital punishment have often argued various reasons why the death penalty is a cruel punishment, but the Supreme Court of the United States has not agreed. A new approach to abolition advocacy is needed. Since the death penalty has not been determined cruel, I submit a new legal argument based on the unusual nature of capital punishment. Utilizing systems theory, I posit the death penalty is an unusual criminal punishment due to the extraordinary range of persons beyond merely the defendant who are negatively impacted by executions.

While passage of Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 had been proclaimed a major advance in redressing congressional-presidential imbalance, knowledgeable participants and observers remain aware that passage of legislation itself does not guarantee congressional reassertion of leadership in fiscal matters without a corresponding performance. That a compromise between House and Senate versions of legislation was forthcoming became known on June 5, 1974, when Conference Committee announced reaching agreement. Supported by a massive staff effort, conferees had labored long to reconcile HR 7130, passed December 5, 1973, with a Senate version of March 22, 1974. After passage by House on June 18 and by Senate on June 21 and a delayed enrollment, it became Public Law 93-344 (88 Stat 297). Senator Sam Irvin, chairman of Government Operations Committee and Senate Floor Manager, had proclaimed this measure to be most important piece of legislation with which he was involved in his culminating 20-year career in Senate and the finest example of legislative process at work that I have witnessed.' While need for congressional budget reform had been recognized for decades, a major impetus during 20-month congressional struggle with procedural reform was its concern for recouping * The new Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, heralded by some as most important budget reform measure since Budget and Accounting Act of 1921, has objective of enabling Congress to gain a better control over spending priorities and other aspects of budget process. It provides for new congressional institutions, an improved analytical capability, a revised timetable with fiscal year shifted to begin October 1, and a demand on President to furnish additional budget data. It further curtails President's authority to withhold appropriations. Its new Budget Committees, assisted by a new Congressional Budget Office, are to take lead in establishing target relationship between appropriation totals and revenue expectations early in each session and then lead in reaffirming congressional position, once appropriation totals are known just before beginning of new fiscal year. It also requires an overt congressional approval of any appropriation rescissions. New officials, tasked with carrying out Act, concur in difficulty of this undertaking because of stringent time limitations, complexity of forces to be reconciled, and scope of decisions to be made.