Orrin Hatch: “Congress has proven, over decades of failure resulting in trillions of dollars of debt, that it will not exercise its…”

“Congress has proven, over decades of failure resulting in trillions of dollars of debt, that it will not exercise its fiscal authority properly. The American people must be given a chance to decide whether to make fiscal responsibility mandatory. It is the American people who ought to decide this. The only way they can is to propose a balanced budget amendment and send it to the States for consideration. I have looked at dozens of national polls since I was first elected to the Senate conducted by major polling firms or national news organizations. Three-quarters of Americans supported a balanced budget amendment in 1976 and three-quarters supported it last year. Is it possible, however, that all of those polls over all those years are actually wrong? The American people might be content with the national debt swallowing the economy. They may not be bothered by being on an unsustainable fiscal path. Who knows, they might welcome soaring national debt interest payments crowding out other budget priorities. They might be OK with slower economic growth and a greater threat to national security. The American people might believe, with balanced budget amendment opponents here in Washington, that the national debt is no big deal or that Congress can solve it on its own. If so, then the American people will decline to ratify a balanced budget amendment, but the choice has to be theirs, not ours. The Peter G.…”