David Cay Johnston: “my friend has outlined the emerging state of the law on the question of standing to sue. The issue of standing to sue…”

“my friend has outlined the emerging state of the law on the question of standing to sue. The issue of standing to sue goes all across the law and provokes about as many decisions as any area of the law that I know about. Suffice it to say it is emerging, dynamic, and changeable. And--as is the question of a political question. In Reynolds versus Sims, and Baker versus Carr, formerly political questions, they changed on that issue. There they were enforcing the 14th amendment, which said nothing about voting rights and which traditionally had been left to the States. So this was a change. This amendment specifically deals with a question of unbalanced budgets. My friend says no taxpayer is particularly harmed by this. You should have heard the eloquent speech--as maybe he did--of my colleague from Illinois, who talked about her child and future deficits. You would think, to hear that, it is the most fundamental issue for our progeny and our families that there is. And I believe the Court would find that standing to sue. What I find to be objectionable, among other things, I say to my friend, is this is deliberately ambiguous.”