Buencamino does political affairs analysis for Action for EconomicReforms. This piece was published in the newspaper Today, 8 September 2004, page 9.
If history repeats itself, I should think we can expect the same thing again. -NBC softball announcer in Athens Olympics
When Ronald Reagan was President and the US government was in the midstof run-away budget deficits, he proposed a constitutional amendmentmandating a balanced budget. The initiative was later refined by hissuccessors to rescissions and a line- item veto. Eventually, aline-item veto act was passed by Congress.
During the debates prior to passing the law, Senator Byrd, thenChairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, waged a losing battleagainst granting the President a Line-Item Veto. He delivered a seriesof 14 speeches from May to October 1993 that raised questions regardingthe separation of powers and the system of checks and balances that atri-partite form of government rests upon. Naturally, he was accused ofprotecting pork, which he was, but he was also addressing issues thatgo to the very root of what a republic is all about.
In the first of his speeches, he warned, “In search of antidotes forthis fast-spreading fiscal melanoma of suffocating deficits and debt,the budget medicine men have once again begun their annual pilgrimageto the shrine of Saint Line -Item Veto, to worship at the altar offool’s gold, quack remedies, such as enhanced rescission, line -itemveto , and other graven images, which, if adopted, would give rise tounwarranted expectations and possibly raise serious constitutionalquestions involving separation of powers, checks and balances, andcontrol of the national purse.”
In his other speeches he reminded everyone that “When the Roman Senaterelinquished control of the purse to Caesar and to the emperors whofollowed him, that Rome ceased to be a republic.”
He cited English history, “It was my understanding of how the historyof England was influenced by the struggles over the national pursestrings in England, the power of the purse was sharpened, refined, andutilized as a potent weapon to force the king to redress grievances, toresist unreasonable demands by the king, and to promote specific policyobjectives that were important to the people’s representatives inParliament.”
Byrd cautioned against the creation of an elective monarchy. He said,“This essential tool-control of the purse by the people’srepresentatives in Congress—lies at the very foundation of ourfreedoms. This control of the purse is one of the most effectivebulwarks ever constructed to repel a despot, control a tyrant, orshackle the hands of an overreaching executive.”
Today, our Congress cannot increase the budget submitted to it by thePresident, it can only cut it. Furthermore, if the President were tosubmit a budget which Congress does not find acceptable, the previousyear’s budget is automatically passed without the restrictionscontained in the original. Yet, many across the land clamor forCongress to give up even what little is left of its control over thepurse to the President.
One can say that Congress, because of many members who are crooks,brought this upon itself. But, we must ask, lest we forget: Wasn’t itprecisely Marcos’s exclusive control of the purse that began thehellish journey that brought us to the mess we are in now? Do wewant the same thing to happen over and over again? Are we doomed neverto learn our lessons?
Pork barrel can and should be rationalized—but not by gifting oneindividual with the awesome power of exclusive control over the purseand expecting that individual to remain rational. That is just plaincrazy.
We cannot allow President Arroyo to emerge a winner in the fiscalcrisis that she, in large part, created. We cannot give her theultimate power.
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