Byron Dorgan: “we wanted to come to the floor today because we have watched for a number of weeks a discussion on the floor of the…”

“we wanted to come to the floor today because we have watched for a number of weeks a discussion on the floor of the Senate about changing the United States Constitution to require a balanced budget. In fact, for a good many weeks we had a stack almost 5-foot tall of books. Apparently they represented budget books and budgets that were submitted by Presidents to Congress and described various budget deficits over many years. And that 5-foot stack of books resided on the desk over there for I think 3 or 4 weeks in the Chamber. The discussion was: ``Let us change the Constitution to require a balanced budget.'' We had that vote. Those books are now gone. Now, of course, comes the real work. Altering the Constitution of the United States is one thing. Balancing the budget by writing a yearly budget, which the Congress is required to do following the submission of a budget by the President, is quite another thing. I made the point during the debate on the constitutional amendment to balance the budget that we could alter the Constitution at 12 o'clock noon that requires a balanced budget and at 12:01 there would be no difference in either Federal debt or Federal deficit. Why? Because that is required to be done in the individual yearly choices of taxing and spending decisions here in the Congress. I do not see anybody out here on the floor on the other side with nearly as much energy on the proposition of writing a budget that will really balance the budget.…”