March 22, 1979
Page 6066
Mr. ARMSTRONG. It does.
If the Senator from Kansas will yield further, I should like to address an inquiry to the distinguished chairman of the Finance Committee about the effect of his portion of the amendment. I ask the chairman if he will clarify the amendment as it now stands. I have read the interesting colloquy he engaged in with the distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee on October 15 regarding the jurisdictional questions, and I am not sure whether or not the Senator's
amendment unintentionally changes the outcome of that decision.
In brief, as I understand what happened last October 5, it was to say that anything in the outyears — that is, beyond the budget years — which was normally a Finance Committee bill or normally a bill assigned to another committee would not fall within the jurisdiction of the Budget Committee.
However, it seems to me that there might be an interpretation of the amendment of the Senator from Louisiana, were it to be adopted, to place an additional year — that is, beyond the budget year — within the jurisdiction of the Budget Committee. Therefore, if that happened, under section 306 of the Budget Act, I am wondering if additional years legislation would come under the Budget Committee's jurisdiction.
I doubt that the chairman intended that, and I wonder whether he can clarify that.
Mr. LONG. We will consider that. There are ways provided in the law that those types of problems can be satisfied. We would propose to comply with the requirements of the budget law.
I do not know that I would try to abide by the suggestion that the Senator from Kansas made yesterday afternoon, that we should not be denied the opportunity to vote on his amendment by a technicality or by one of the provisions of the budget law. There are ways it can be done, and the Senator from Kansas is pretty familiar with those problems. He serves on the Budget Committee.
I am learning, and I have been for some years. We have in mind complying with the procedures that are necessary in the budget law, and in due course we will.
Mr. ARMSTRONG. Perhaps at another time — apparently, he is not prepared to take us into his confidence now — the distinguished chairman could go into that, because it seems to me that this is an important issue.
As things now stand, I understand the parliamentary situation is that the Finance Committee cannot bring to the floor a tax bill affecting current year revenues or budget year revenues unless it had obtained a waiver from the Budget Committee. I am concerned that whether or not we adopt the Senator's portion of the pending amendment, the effect would be to extend the jurisdiction of the Budget Committee an additional year. Is it the Senator's opinion that that would not be the case?
Mr. LONG. What we would have here, in the first instance, is that on April 15 we would have projections of what is to be expected if we are to balance the budget as envisaged by the Budget Committees. It may be that the Budget Committees will recommend some things that would cause some problems on the Finance Committee and perhaps the Appropriations Committee as well. But at that point we are not bound by it. We are looking at what they think you would have to do to have a balanced budget. Obviously, that will leave open the alternatives for any of us to suggest that you should do it somewhat differently — for example, if their projections would envisage that we pass a tax, that does not bind the Senate at that point to do it that way and it does not bind us to pass that particular tax. It simply says, "Here is how we think it should be done"; and we would hope to work from that and arrive at what we think would be the best way to balance the budget.
Mr. PACKWOOD. Mr. President, if I may further respond, as I read this and intended it, the Budget Committee's binding authority is only year by year, other than for some very technical exceptions that we already discussed in past debates in the Chamber. If this passes by April 15 this year, the Budget Committee will recommend how they think the budget might be balanced in fiscal year 1981 and fiscal year 1982.
Let us say, for example, the Budget Committee says, "All right, we think the way it might be balanced in 1981, considering that we might have a 7, 8, to 9 percent inflation, is there will simply be no tax cut and because people are pushed into higher tax brackets and the revenues go up it will catch up with the expenditures, and that is our estimate how we might balance the budget in fiscal year 1981."
That is not binding on this Congress.
Mr. ARMSTRONG. Is the Senator saying, then, the amendment, if adopted, does not expand the jurisdiction of the Budget Committee within the meaning of section 306 of the Budget Act?
Mr. PACKWOOD. It is not my intention. I do not think it does. The Budget Committee has authority now to bring out estimates, guesstimates, if you want to call them that, estimates or suggestions. The only thing binding is the resolution we finally adopt, the last one in September.
As I read the resolution, the Budget Committee will do two things for fiscal years beyond the fiscal year that we are preparing the budget for. The Budget Committee will make suggestions as to how the budget might be balanced, cutting expenditures, increasing taxes, or a combination of both. On April 15 of the year in which we are preparing the budget for the following fiscal year, the Budget Committee will come forth with a concurrent resolution and that resolution, according to this amendment, will be a balanced budget resolution, and they may come forth with alternative suggestions for 1 year, and that after we debate it and after we get to September 15 will bind this Congress. But we are giving them no additional authority beyond what they currently possess for outyear binding budget recommendations.
Mr. ARMSTRONG. I appreciate the Senator's explanation.
I wonder if the distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee shares that understanding of the
amendment.
Mr. MUSKIE. Yes, I share it. I think that explanation is a very lucid one. I found nothing in it, and I listened closely, with which I will disagree.
Mr. ARMSTRONG. I am sorry. I cannot hear the Senator.
Mr. MUSKIE.. I listened to the explanation of the distinguished Senator from Oregon very closely because I was interested in his response, and I found nothing in what he said to which I take exception.
Mr. ARMSTRONG. I thank the Senator for the explanation, and while for policy reasons I still adhere to my early decision, I think that clarification is useful so there will not be any muddy water in the RECORD about expanding the jurisdiction of the Budget Committee.
Several Senators addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas still has the floor.
Mr. BUMPERS. Mr. President, will the Senator from Kansas yield for a question?
Mr. DOLE. I yield for a question.
Mr. BUMPERS. The perfecting amendment offered by the Senator from Kansas provides that once the Senate adopts a balanced budget, it may not be rescinded by less than three-fifths vote of the Senate. Is that correct?
Mr. DOLE. That is correct.
Mr. BUMPERS. This is a simple piece of legislation. Of course, it is not a constitutional amendment. Could not that requirement of the three-fifths majority be amended at any time by a simple majority of the Senate?
Mr. DOLE. That is correct.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for what I believe is a correction?
Mr. DOLE. I yield.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. The distinguished Senator asked if the amendment by the distinguished Senator from Kansas meant that a three-fifths vote of the Senate is what is being required. The Senator means three-fifths vote of both Houses, does he not?
Mr. DOLE. That is right, both Houses.
Mr. BUMPERS. That is a correction. I misspoke myself. I meant both Houses.
But both Houses can change that requirement by a simple majority. The Senator will agree with that, will he not?
Mr. DOLE. I would like to point out that my amendment, if the distinguished Senator from Arkansas would note, applies to the debt limit. It simply provides that beginning with fiscal year 1981 there may be no more debt limit increases beyond the May 1, 1980 level unless the second concurrent resolution on the budget provides for a balanced or surplus budget or unless more than three-fifths of the House and Senate agree to a budget resolution which projects a deficit.
Mr. BUMPERS. We can do either of two things then. We can adopt by that time a balanced budget or three-fifths of Congress can vote to raise the debt ceiling. Is that the substance of the amendment?
Mr. DOLE. Yes.
Mr. BUMPERS. If it can be changed by a simple majority vote, what is the purpose of the requirement of three-fifths vote? Procedurally I assume at the time we reach that point any Senator could offer an amendment to amend this amendment to require a simple majority and once that is done, then a second vote will be taken to raise the debt ceiling by a simple majority. Is that not correct?
Mr. DOLE. It is the view of the Senator from Kansas that we are going to have more discipline and we are not going to permit a debt limit increase unless we have a balanced budget or surplus budget or more than three-fifths of the House and Senate agree to a budget resolution which projects a deficit.
Mr. BUMPERS. If I may pursue this just a little further, does not the Senator object to that part of the substitute amendment which goes beyond 1981? What is the objection to that part of the substitute which carries it 1 year further to 1982 and also requires a balanced budget in that year?
Mr. DOLE. As the Senator from Kansas said earlier, I am still not satisfied — maybe before we finish the distinguished Senator from Maine can satisfy all of us. Just what legal effect does the April 15, 1979, provision have on the Budget Committee as far as the fiscal year 1981 budget is concerned or the fiscal year 1982 budget is concerned? That is one of the reservations. All we have said, in effect, and I assume the Senator is talking about the Long substitute, is that Congress shall balance the Federal budget. Pursuant to this mandate, the Budget Committee shall report by April 15, 1979, the fiscal year budget for 1981, which shall be in balance.
I think the question has been asked of the distinguished chairman a number of times, is the understanding of this Senator correct that on April 15, 1979 or soon thereafter we would vote on a budget for 1981?
Mr. MUSKIE. The Senate will vote, as I understand the Senator's amendment, on the budget for 1980, which it must under the present law; and in addition, the same resolution, as I read this amendment, would require the Senate to vote on the balanced budget for 1981.
Mr. DOLE. Would we avoid any votes in April next year?
Mr. MUSKIE. Of course not, because each year the Senate and Congress as a whole have the responsibility to adopt a budget for the current year. That would mean we would have to take a look at what we voted on this year in light of the economic circumstances a year from now, and either we affirmed our vote of this year or changed it.
There is one other point to be made. As the Senator knows, even if we agreed to a balanced budget for 1981 this year and also next year, the makeup of those two budgets could be different, depending upon the rate of inflation, the rate of unemployment, and so on. So it would be necessary for us to act again next year. Indeed, it would be the better part of wisdom to act again next year, because the makeup of the balanced budget for 1981 next year would very likely look different than the makeup for the 1981 balanced budget we put together this year, and to prevent ourselves from recognizing the need for making those changes, I think, would be foolhardy.
But, as I read this, it is an attempt within the constraints of our inability to control economic forces ultimately and within the requirements of the Budget Act to enable the Senate to make a commitment within 6 weeks to a balanced budget for fiscal year 1981, if that is the decision of the Senate after the Senate has been given the Budget Committee's best estimate of the consequences of such a decision. The Budget Committee will also present the option of a balanced budget in 1982 to the Senate for its consideration.
Then, of course, in addition, the Budget Committee may have some recommendations to offer with respect to either year for the consideration of the Senate, which I would expect the Senate would regard it as its duty to do. Then, of course, it is always open to any Senator to offer a substitute to any budget resolution or amendments to any budget resolution. All the options would be open, but the commitment would be clear.
The Budget Committee, may I reassure the Senator, would not try to play games with it. If you tell us to present a balanced budget for 1981, we will do our best to present it in such a way that there was a reasonable distribution among the priorities in the budget. We would not try to play games that would prejudice any particular interest or any other priority. I can assure the Senate of that. We would present a straight document, an honest document, that reflected, as best we could, our understanding of the priorities which the Senate wished to have addressed in that balanced budget.
Mr. DOLE. I appreciate the comments of the Senator from Maine, I have the greatest respect for him. I know how diligently the Budget Committee works. I have been on the Budget Committee so I know how painful the process is. I also know how easy it is to say one thing and do another — and I am not talking about the distinguished Senator from Maine. But I think the Senator had a chart last year that indicated that those who stood up as conservatives were really not conservative about budget cutting.
We had the example this year in the Committee on Agriculture where we had to cut about a half-million dollars out of the school lunch program and the summer program, and that was not easy.
Then we moved over to the Committee on Finance, where we had to take $1.5 billion out of the health care category, and that was not easy, but it was done to stay within the $29 billion deficit.
So the Senator from Kansas certainly understands the enormity and the severity of the problem and the way it has been addressed — which I think is in the most appropriate way — by the Budget Committee. So I certainly have no quarrel with the distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee.
Several Senators addressed the Chair.
Mr. MUSKIE. Mr. President, will the Senator yield?
Mr. DOLE. Yes, I yield.
Mr. MUSKIE. There is another point I need to make. As the Senator knows, and as everyone in the Senate now knows, on March 15 every committee of the Senate, including Appropriations, Finance, and the other legislative committees, is required under the Budget Act to report to the Budget Committee its best estimates of program needs for the budget year for which we are budgeting.
We have received those March 15 reports for fiscal year 1980. We have not totaled them up finally, but if I understand correctly these reports ask us to provide almost $40 billion more in budget authority than is required over current law.
So even before we get to cutting the President's budget, we are going to have to look at and cut most of the additional requests that committees have told us on March 15 are essential services for fiscal year 1980.
That is not going to be easy. I am on a couple of legislative committees myself, and try as we might we were not able to hold our requests down to the President's recommendations.
Now we are being asked to cut below the President's recommendations in order to achieve a balance in 1981. Senators ought to understand that.
It is consequences of that kind about which I am talking. We have all these legislative committees making honest judgments based on their experience of the minimum necessary in the areas over which they have jurisdiction. But we are going to have to ignore those recommendations, by and large, or cut even more deeply into some functions of the Government in order to preserve what legislative committees have recommended as to other functions, and that is not going to be easy.
Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I would be happy to yield to the distinguished majority leader, but not for a motion to table.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. I would like to ask the Senator a question.
Mr. DOLE. I yield for a question.
Mr. ROBERT C. BYRD. May I ask the distinguished Senator how long he intends to hold the floor?
Mr. DOLE. I might say in all candor to the distinguished majority leader that I have just checked, and there are five proponents of the amendment missing on this Senator's side. I would assume I would talk as long as necessary for them to return.