No One Is Responsible

April 22, 1957

The efforts of the President and Congress to pass on to each other responsibility for cutting the 1958 budget do not provide an encouraging spectacle, but they do provide an instructive one. They emphasize more than ever that we do not have a responsible budget system. There will be no real economy until we get one.

There are glaring inconsistencies both in the statements of the President and in the actions of Congress. Just before the Republican convention of 1952, Mr. Eisenhower expressed the opinion that the Federal budget could be cut as much as $40 billion in the next few years. In October of 1952 he declared: “My goal, assuming that the cold war gets no worse, is to cut Federal spending to something like $60 billion within four years.” In the same month he said:

“We must find a substitute for the purely temporary business of bolstering the free nations through annual handouts. That gets neither permanent results nor real friends.” Also in the same month (speaking of an annual budget of $70 billion) he said:

“We can’t afford what we’re spending and stay strong enough to lead the world to peace.” But now he declares, deploring even diminutive cuts in his own $72 billion budget: “If we are going to wage peace abroad, and try to provide the leadership and the services at home that our people demand, then we have got to pay for it.”

IGNORING ITS OWN LAWS

Congress, in its Reorganization Act of 1946, provided for joint meetings of the tax and appropriations committees of both houses at the beginning of each session to draw up a legislative budget for the ensuing fiscal year. Since 1949 it has completely ignored its own legislation on this point.

Buck-passing regarding economy would not be possible if we could once establish a responsible Executive budget system. Under such a system the Executive not only presents an itemized list of all proposed expenditures, but of all proposed changes in taxes necessary to meet those expenditures. This budget is accompanied by bills containing all the proposed appropriations and any proposed new taxes. The Legislature has the power to strike out or reduce expenditure items in such a budget, but not to add or increase any.

This rule against legislative increase has prevailed in Britain for more than two centuries. Under such a system budget responsibility is inescapably fixed upon the Executive. But he gains great advantages in compensation. The President, for example, would know in advance that Congress could not destroy courageous economies by making lavish appropriations of its own to pressure groups. If the President is sincere in his professed desire for economy, he will recommend a constitutional amendment to Congress, now, to create such a responsible budget system.

CONGRESS AS WATCHDOG

And if Congress on its side is sincere in desiring economy and a really responsible budget, it will not hesitate to accept such a self-denying amendment. It will even draft and submit one, whether or not the President asks for it. Congress, too, would find great compensations for giving up the power to increase or add appropriations. Congressmen would no longer be hounded by constituents or lobbyists demanding more appropriations for their districts or their pressure groups. Congressmen could refer all such demands to the Executive branch, and they would surely exercise far more than now their power to reduce proposed expenditures. “There is no propensity of human nature more marked than jealousy of opportunities that one does not share.” Instead of competition between the President and Congress in spending, there would be competition in economy.

Perhaps it is utopian to hope that Congress could be persuaded to deprive itself completely of the power of increasing expenditures beyond those asked for by the President. But it might be willing to go at least as far as the Legislatures of many states, and limit itself to power to add proposed expenditures only in separate bills, individually subject to Presidential veto. Congress should be the watchman of the Treasury. It can be counted on to perform its duty as watchman only if it does not itself have access to the Treasury.