Kent Conrad: “In fact, we might have a whole budget section over at the Supreme Court. You might see an exodus of the budget experts…”

“In fact, we might have a whole budget section over at the Supreme Court. You might see an exodus of the budget experts on Capitol Hill. We would be in a contest with our courts now to have their own budget experts. If I can make one further inquiry, and that is with respect to what States that have a balanced budget amendment do to avoid or evade the requirements of a balanced budget amendment. I would be interested in the perspective of the chairman of the Appropriations Committee on what States do. I just had a conversation with a fellow Senator from another State who said in his State they have a balanced budget amendment but they get around it by having off-budget items in which they go to a taxing district, or some other district that is permitted to issue bonds, to take on debt and then they service that debt by having payments made to that other entity. It is not State government strictly speaking. By that artifice, they avoid the requirements of a State balanced budget amendment. In fact, I just read last night a study that indicated the vast majority of States that had a balanced budget amendment in fiscal year 1991 actually spent more than they took in. In other words, the vast majority found ways around the balanced budget requirements they have in their own Constitutions by this method of taking things off budget, by shifting the timing of spending and by other artifices that they have creatively, I might say, conjured up.”