# The 14th Amendment and the Debt Ceiling
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [October 9, 2013, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739 "2013-10-09T02:01:31Z")
**Posts on this page:** 10
**Page:** 6
### Author:  [@deltasigma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/deltasigma)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2013, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/101 "2013-10-12T02:42:43Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#):
>
> How is November 1st doable? It certainly doesn’t LOOK doable.
That’s what several commentators have said and if you think about it for a moment, it makes sense at least that Oct 17th wouldn’t be the actual deadline. I mean do you really think Jack Lew and the president would tell the brain dead simians in Congress what the REAL deadlline was. Come on. :smack:
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### Author:  [@PhillyGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PhillyGuy)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2013, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/102 "2013-10-12T03:28:16Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#):
>
> How is November 1st doable? It certainly doesn’t LOOK doable.
Perhaps he or she is thinking that the 20 percent of Treasury employees still on the job can, in the next three weeks, reprogram their systems to allow holding back various classes of disbursements.
My understanding is that it would take far longer to develop such a capability, and no one is working on it.
By the way, this in in contrast to the shutdown, for which there are long-standing policies and procedures.
It’s insane that a democracy would have procedures in place for either a shutdown or a stoppage in paying its bills.
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### Author:  [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2013, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/103 "2013-10-12T04:35:15Z")
> [@deltasigma](#):
>
> That’s what several commentators have said and if you think about it for a moment, it makes sense at least that Oct 17th wouldn’t be the actual deadline. I mean do you really think Jack Lew and the president would tell the brain dead simians in Congress what the REAL deadlline was. Come on. :smack:
As I understand it, the federal government receives and pays out money every day. They generally pay out more than they get so they were going to run out of money on the 17th. When they shut down the government, they didn’t have to pay out a lot of the disbursements but come the first of the month, they have to cover the social security nut and no amount of cost cutting is going to let them get past that date. Then, we not accumulate enough money between the 1st and the 15th to pay the interest on our debt.
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### Author:  [@deltasigma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/deltasigma)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2013, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/104 "2013-10-12T15:14:00Z")
I’m just telling you what I’ve heard. If you think I’m one of those people who believes that the Treasury can prioritize payments and avoid a default, then you haven’t read many of my posts on this matter.
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### Author:  [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2013, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/105 "2013-10-12T15:32:40Z")
The Treasury always has money going in and out but some days there are bigger payments than others. Several commentators have said that while they don’t know if we’ll hit one of those days where the treasury will have less cash on hand than it needs to make in payments between 10/17 and 11/1, there is a “certainty” that on 11/1 that will be the case. Apparently something like $60bn in payments on various things have to happen on 11/1, and while we _may_ have enough in the coffers from 10/17-10/31 to make all the payments on those days, there is no conceivable way we’ll have $60bn in the coffers on 11/1.
So I think 11/1 is the “guaranteed default date” and 10/17-10/31 are “days where we might run out of money, but no one has said for sure or maybe even knows for sure because receipts are variable.”
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### Author:  [@Honesty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Honesty)
#### Post date: [October 13, 2013, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/106 "2013-10-13T02:16:03Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#):
>
> **Not making payroll, basically**.
>
> It’s the difference between GE failing to make payroll and GE failing to make its bond interest payments. One is default, one isn’t. [In my example the employees of GE can sue and are protected to a degree by DoL regulations. SS beneficiaries and Federal employees don’t have the same protections. Federal contractors would probably eventually be owed penalty money as per the contract.]
(bolding mine)
I think I get it. You label the “full faith and credit of the United States” to the narrow slice of $220 billion dollars owed to treasury bondholders, correct? Further, all refusing to pay other financial obligations, is not technically a default, thus does not violate the 14th amendment, right? The lack of a constitutional protection for SS, Medicare, SNAP, and other benefit programs is disconcerting because once the longer beneficiaries and furloughed workers don’t get paid, the higher the chance the economy slips into another recession. In this case, if the 14th amendment is to be interpreted to pay the $220 in interest payments and to refuse to pay the remainder of the \>$960 billion, the amendment is simply too flimsy to protect the economy from a self-induced recession.
What a shame.
- Honesty
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### Author:  [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)
#### Post date: [October 14, 2013, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/107 "2013-10-14T01:05:58Z")
I saw a comment on a blog (unsourced, so take with a grain of salt) that Rep. Louie Gohmert asserted that “debt default is an impeachable offense.” Regardless of whether this is actually something he said, I’ve seen other assertions with the same substance elsewhere. Is this so?
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### Author:  [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)
#### Post date: [October 14, 2013, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/108 "2013-10-14T01:17:40Z")
Can members of the House be impeached?
As far as Presidential offenses go, anything is “an impeachable offense” if enough Congressmen vote for it to be. “The President cracked his breakfast egg open at the little end!” Hey, if a majority of the House votes for an article of impeachment, it’s an impeachment. (Hope at least 1/3 + 1 of the members of the Senate are little-endians too!)
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### Author:  [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)
#### Post date: [October 14, 2013, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/109 "2013-10-14T01:45:18Z")
Members of Congress can be expelled by their respective houses, but not impeached, which requires both houses to act.
Mr Gohmert is a grade A idiot. Management of the debt is an Article I, Section 8 power of Congress, meaning it is the responsibility of Congress not to fuck it up. His comments are as stupid as a President saying, “America, we’ve had tremendous losses on the battlefield lately. The problem is clearly one of failure to command our armed forces effectively. Therefore, I’m calling on these members of Congress to resign immediately…”
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### Author:  [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)
#### Post date: [October 14, 2013, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-14th-amendment-and-the-debt-ceiling/670739/110 "2013-10-14T06:03:10Z")
[Found the source for the Gohmert quote, BTW.](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/13/louie-gohmert-impeach_n_4094707.html)
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