David Obey: “I note one comment the previous speaker just made, that we should not return to issues upon which we have already voted.…”

“I note one comment the previous speaker just made, that we should not return to issues upon which we have already voted. The problem is that we have not yet explicitly voted on this provision. This provision was never presented to us in a freestanding up-or-down situation. It was presented only in the rule, where it was encompassed in a package with a number of other items. The Constitution says that no money may be expended except by vote of the Congress of the United States. And yet through this indirect sleight of hand, were the Chair to rule against the amendment of the gentleman from Missouri, it would mean that in essence we would have paved the way for raising the national debt by $750 billion without ever having had an explicit vote on that. So I think the gentleman is in error in suggesting that we have already voted on the specific proposal of the gentleman. In fact, we have not. That is the whole point. The House should.”