Rep. Nan Hayworth, R-N.Y., center, accompanied by, from left, Rep. Todd Rokita, R-Ind., Rep. Austin Scott, R-G., and Rep. Rick Berg, R-N.D., shows a photo of her children, Will and Jack, during a House Republican freshmen news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Nov. 17, 2011, to discuss a Balanced Budget Amendment. (AP Photo/Harry Hamburg)
Rep. Nan Hayworth, R-N.Y., center, accompanied by, from left, Rep. Todd Rokita, R-Ind., Rep. Austin Scott, R-G., and Rep. Rick Berg, R-N.D., shows a photo of her children, Will and Jack, during a House Republican freshmen news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Nov. 17, 2011, to discuss a Balanced Budget Amendment. (AP Photo/Harry Hamburg)
Members of the House Republican freshman class, led by class President Rep. Austin Scott, R-Ga., center, gestures during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Nov. 17, 2011, to discuss a Balanced Budget Amendment. (AP Photo/Harry Hamburg)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? The House votes Friday on whether to adopt a constitutional balanced budget amendment as a means of forcing Congress to come to grips with its inability to deal with spiraling deficits.
The vote takes place as the bipartisan supercommittee tasked with coming up with at least $1.2 trillion in deficit reduction over the next decade appears locked in partisan gridlock. The amendment, dictating that Congress not spend any more than it takes in in any given year, also comes up after a budget year in which government spending topped revenues by $1.3 trillion.
"Only a balanced budget constitutional amendment will save us from unending federal deficits," said Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith, R-Texas. "It is our last line of defense against Congress' unending desire to overspend and overtax."
A majority of House members support the amendment, but it's unclear whether Republicans, the main proponents, can pick up enough Democrats to reach the two-thirds majority needed for passage.
The vote will be the first by the House on a balanced budget amendment since 1995, when a similar proposal passed with the support of the then-new Republican majority and 72 Democrats.
This time, while Republicans enjoy a stronger majority than in 1995, the White House has come out against it and the Democratic leadership, warning of the dire consequences of forced spending cuts during an economic downturn, is urging its members to reject it. The measure would also have an uphill fight in the Senate.
In 1995 and again in 1997, the Senate fell one vote short of approving a balanced budget amendment. Amendments must be approved by two-thirds majorities in the two chambers and be ratified by three-fourths of state legislatures. The last amendment ratified, the 27th in 1992, concerned lawmakers' pay increases.
Rep. Robert Goodlatte, R-Va., the chief sponsor of the measure, said Congress "has not made the tough decisions. We have overpromised the American people, and the fact of the matter is now we need to have something in the Constitution that the American people expect and demand of us, and that is a balanced budget amendment."
Democrats countered that a balanced budget requirement could force Congress to make drastic and harmful spending cuts during economic downturns when federal revenues fall and that disputes over how to reach balance could result in Congress ceding its power over the purse to the courts.
"The Republican majority wants to enshrine in the Constitution a permanent hostage crisis for our economy," Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Fla., said.
In a major break from 1995, Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland has been leading the opposition to a proposal he supported 16 years before. "While Republicans claim that they want to restore fiscal responsibility, their track record doesn't offer any optimism that they will put partisan politics aside and act responsibly in the event of an emergency," he said.
Another Democrat who said he is changing his yes vote from 1995 was Rep. Jim Moran of Virginia, who said, "I could never have imagined back in 1995 the chaos we experienced this summer" when the country came close to defaulting on its financial obligations because of the fight over raising the government's borrowing limit.
A senior Republican, Rules Committee Chairman David Dreier of California, also said he would not support the amendment as he had in 1995. Dreier said Congress should have the will to balance the budget without changing the Constitution and warned of "protracted legal battles" in which the courts would end up deliberating over budgets that had passed years before.
If all 434 active members of Congress voted and all 242 Republicans supported the amendment, it would still require 48 Democratic votes to reach the 290 needed for a two-thirds majority. There is one vacancy in the 435-member House.
To attract Democrats, Republicans opted for a version of the measure offered by Goodlatte that does not, as many conservatives wanted, set a tight cap on government spending or require a supermajority to raise taxes. It does require a three-fifths vote by both chambers to raise the debt ceiling and a three-fifths vote to approve a deficit in any one year. Congress could also waive the amendment in times of serious military conflict.
The amendment does have the overall support of the so-called Blue Dogs, a 25-member group of fiscally conservative Democrats. "If it does not pass both the House and the Senate," Blue Dog leader Mike Ross, D-Ark., said, "it speaks volumes about the dysfunction of the Congress."
But other Democrats pointed to a letter from some 275 labor and other mostly liberal groups saying that forced spending cuts or raised taxes needed to balance the budget when the economy is slow "would risk tipping a faltering economy into recession or worsening an ongoing downturn, costing large number of jobs."
Democrats also cited a report by the liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimating that, if there is not an increase in revenues, the amendment could force Congress to cut all programs by an average of 17.3 percent by 2018.
The amendment would not go into effect until 2017, or two years after it is ratified, whichever comes later, and supporters say that would give Congress time to avoid dramatic spending cuts.
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