The Republican Congress We could have lost it all after the Democratic Congress passed the largest tax hike in history in 1993 that threatened to bring back the tax-and-spend follies of the bad old days. But the
voters wouldn't have it and, in the next election, for the first time in forty
years, they put Republican majorities in charge of both Houses of Congress. The difference that made can be put into
numbers. In the four decades from 1954
to 1994, government spending increased at an average annual rate of 7.9 percent,
and the public's debt increased from $224 billion to $3.4 trillion. Since 1994, with Republicans leading the
House and Senate, spending has been held to an annual 3.1 percent rate of
growth, and the nation's debt will be nearly $400 billion lower by the end of
this year. The federal government has
operated in the black for the last two years and is now projected to run a
surplus of nearly $5 trillion over ten years.
That wasn't magic. It took
honesty and guts from a Congress that manages the nation's purse strings. Over a
five year period, as surpluses continue to grow, we will return half a trillion
dollars to the taxpayers who really own it, without touching the Social Security
surplus. That's what we mean by our
Lock-Box: The Social Security surplus is off-limits, off budget, and will not be
touched. We will not stop there, for we are also determined to protect Medicare
and to pay down the national debt.
Reducing that debt is both a sound policy goal and a moral imperative. Our families and most states are required to
balance their budgets; it is reasonable to assume the federal government should
do the same. Therefore, we reaffirm our
support for a constitutional amendment to require a balanced budget.
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Fiscal discipline. We must restore responsibility to our budget, or we will strangle opportunity
for the next generation of middle class Americans. Over the last three years, record surpluses have
turned into record deficits. Not once has this Administration tried to balance new spending with
new savings or pay for new initiatives – including its enormous tax breaks for the wealthy. Today,
we face unsustainable foreign borrowing and rising interest rates.
Fiscal discipline helped create 23 million new jobs in the 1990s. Fiscal discipline frees up money
for productive investment. And over time, fiscal discipline saves families thousands of dollars on
their mortgages and credit cards.
We will roll back the Bush tax cuts for those making more than $200,000. We will restore
commonsense budget rules that this Administration has abandoned, like "Pay-As-You-Go" rules
that require the government to pay for new initiatives. We will commit to living within tough
budget caps—real and enforceable limits on what the government can spend. We will enact a
Constitutional version of the line-item veto to make it easier to root out pork-barrel spending.
And we will make our government more efficient by cutting the waste of taxpayer dollars in the
federal budget, from unneeded travel budgets to crony contracting. We are committed to cutting
the deficit in half over the next four years. |
| Government DebtThe Issue: Government debt forces individuals to assume debt that they did not choose to incur; distorts capital markets and rates and ruins the economy.
The Principle: Government must not incur debt, nor should it be allowed
to hold assets, for these are debts incumbent on and assets taken away
from the individuals of this country.
Solutions: We
support the drive for a constitutional amendment requiring the national
government to balance its budget, and also support similar amendments to
require balanced state budgets. To be effective, a balanced budget
amendment should provide:
a. that neither Congress nor the
President be permitted to override this requirement;
b. that all
off-budget items are included in the budget;
c. that the budget
is balanced exclusively by cutting expenditures, and not by raising
taxes; and
d. that no exception be made for periods of national
emergency.
Governments facing fiscal crises should always
default in preference to raising taxes.
Transitional Action:
The Federal Reserve must be forbidden to acquire any additional
government securities, thereby helping to eliminate the inflationary
aspect of the deficit. At a minimum, the level of government should be
frozen.
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