This episode will be forgotten in a few years, just like the 1996 debt limit showdown was quickly forgotten. That doesn’t mean the debt limit is not significant.
You don’t think there’s a chance this will be the first in a string of “hostage negotiations” by the minority party?
It is already at least the second hostage negotiation. See my previous link about the agreement reached in April.
Ravenmen, your assertion:
isn’t correct. Call it a budget agreement or an appropriation, it makes no difference. The pertinent part of 14th Amendment says:
That provision has no qualification limiting it to Article I Section 8 or 9. Textualists are stuck with the text.
Appropriations are not authorizations to issue debt. They never have been.
The authority to issue debt, once again, is an Art I, Sec 8 power. The appropriations power is Art I, Sec 9. They are different powers of Congress.
Let me illustrate the difference better: appropriations are laws to allow funds to be drawn from the treasury. Authorizations for debt are laws to allow for funds to be put in the treasury. They are fundamentally different actions, and there is no basis to believe that the exercise of one power either implies or compels the exercise of the other.
Consider this. Suppose the President announces that the debt limit is unconstitutional because of the 14th amendment, and orders the Treasury to borrow as needed to meet our obligations.
Who could stop him? Who has standing to sue? The Congress? Good luck in getting both houses to agree to that.
I will leave the question of standing to the lawyers, but I’m pretty sure impeachment is another remedy that Congress could examine.
With a Democratic-controlled Senate? At most, you’d get a replay of the Clinton impeachment with an even bigger stink of bullshit.
Wouldn’t it just be better to let a country buy us out? In a game I once played, called Spore, when you reached Civ Stage, you could become an Economic nation, which relies on trade routes to buy other nations, so that your nation can expand its borders. With China owning most our debt, and us having unexpected budget shortfalls, wouldn’t it just be better to let China buy us outright? Maybe sell our territories? How much do you think we could get for Puerto Rico?
Better than what? What imminent crisis do we face that is so bad that it would be better to live under Chinese rule?
If a president declares that he can simply take over any Art I, Sec 8 power from Congress, I think the rule of thumb is that is a Constitutional crisis that would tend not to be judged by partisan means.
I’m a bug supporter of Obama, but I would support his removal from office if he simply declared that Congress no longer had the authority to “borrow money on the credit of the United States,” and that power now resided in the Executive Branch.
On the flipside, we could expand our borders. We trade with so many nations, that I’m sure there’s a few we could buy with China’s money.
What is the constitutional authority for a debt ceiling that conflicts with a debt that is the direct effect of appropriations, budget, authorizations, etc. otherwise passed IAW with the constitution.
I don’t think anyone is arguing about the president grabbing power, just that when congress does things that contradict themselves, the president can select the one that seems to not violate the constitution and let the legal process sort it out. For that matter, he can select one that he likes that does seem to contradict the constitution and let the courts sort it out.
The constitutional authority for Congress regulating debt is found in Art I, Sec 8: “Congress shall have the power to borrow money on the credit of the United States.” The constitutional authority for appropriations is found in Art I, Sec 9: “No money shall be drawn from the treasury, but in consequence of appropriations made by law.” There is no contradiction. There is no ambiguity. An appropriation is not an authorization for debt, just like an appropriation doesn’t imply that taxes may be increased.
There is no contradiction. There is no ambiguity that an appropriation isn’t an authorization for debt, just like an appropriation isn’t a tax increase, just like an appropriation isn’t a declaration of war. If the President were to say that an appropriation is an authorization for debt, he is literally stealing Art I, Sec 8 powers from Congress.
The US has debt. I thought all of that debt came about due to the net effect of congressional actions (not without input, agreement and execution from the executive branch).
There is a law that limits how much the total debt can be. Passed by congress and signed by the president (not necessarily the current office holders).
That seems like a conflict to me or did some of that debt happen without a legislative process?
The debt is issued in accordance with a law that allows for the issuance of debt. For many years, Congress passed a specific law issuing a specific amount of debt – there was no debt ceiling, each time debt was issued required a separate law. Finding that process too cumbersome, Congress then chose to issue a debt ceiling, in which the executive was freed to issue debt at times and in such amounts were necessary up to that ceiling. That is the process we are under right now.
For the fifth time, allowing money to be drawn from the treasury is a separate action than allowing money to be put in to the treasury, either by issuing debt or by raising taxes. To the extent that laws allow the expenditure of funds that may not be in the treasury, that is a practical conflict, not a legal one – just like if Congress authorized a war but did not appropriate funds to run the war, the executive can’t complain about Congress sending mixed messages and then illegally fund the war without the consent of Congress.
Got it. I think your point is that debt - defined to be obligations under TITLE 31, SUBTITLE III > CHAPTER 31, SUBCHAPTER I—BORROWING AUTHORITY haven’t exceeded the the current debt ceiling and not going past that limit would not be in conflict with Amendment 14 because those debts don’t exist so you aren’t denying them.
I was thinking that the laws passed by the legislative branch, signed by the executive branch and not overturned by the judicial branch that defines a benefit to any person or entity could be argued to be a debt owed by the US goverment and therefore can not be denied IAW with the 14th. But, that is one that would be decided by the courts not by the Straight Dope. Debt, like many words in English, has multiple meanings.
I know that most military people who served the prime of their adulthood in service to the country feel that the county has a debt to them that is payable in cash on the first of every month.