Byron Dorgan: “Mr. President, I offer a substitute constitutional amendment. This substitute is essentially the same as the amendment…”

“Mr. President, I offer a substitute constitutional amendment. This substitute is essentially the same as the amendment offered by Senator Hatch, amended, if it would have been amended, by the amendment offered by Senator Reid. Senator Reid offered a perfecting amendment. It failed. So I am offering a substitute constitutional amendment to balance the budget. Mr. President, the stack of books that has resided on that desk for some long time now is apparently designed to illustrate a number of budgets that have not been in balance. There is no one in this Chamber, I believe, who stands on the floor of the Senate trying to make a case for unbalanced budgets. I have known no one who stands up and says, 'I've come from my office to the floor of the Senate to put in a few good words about the deficit,' or, 'I come to the floor to be a champion of Federal debt.' I know of no one who says that, no one who believes that, and no one who comes and argues that on the floor of the Senate.”