Orrin Hatch: “If I could be allowed to finish. So the pressures will be on us to try to have surpluses rather than continue to spend…”

“If I could be allowed to finish. So the pressures will be on us to try to have surpluses rather than continue to spend, because sooner or later we have to face the music. Let me make this point. The accuracy of estimates is self-correcting, because OMB and CBO must, by law, correct their estimates twice a year, under current practices. Usually, the original estimates are always off by OMB and CBO. Under the current system, there is not nearly as much pressure to be accurate as there will be under the constitutional amendment system, if we pass this by the requisite two-thirds vote of both Houses and it is ratified by three-quarters of the States. So what if CBO and OMB correct it? The balanced budget amendment does nothing to correct that procedure. It puts pressure on them to, maybe, do more than twice a year corrections. The balanced budget amendment actually will further budgetary discipline. Congress is the one that must always enforce the system. Every one of us take an oath to uphold the Constitution. If this becomes part of the Constitution, we will have to live up to that oath. We will have to devise a system that really does it. We will still operate under a statutory system of implementing the constitutional rule. We can't order perfection; not even we can order perfection. But the balanced budget amendment will put the appropriate amount of pressure on Congress, which is not there now, as easily can be seen by the Senator's very important chart.…”