Making Amends

One way to balance the budget

It was almost as if the nation's leading distiller had suddenly come out in favor of Prohibition. Having unveiled the biggest deficit in U.S. history, President Reagan said at his press conference last week that he approved the concept of a constitutional amendment requiring a balanced federal budget. He is expected to endorse the proposal formally later this month. The irony was not lost on the Democrats or, indeed, on the White House. Admitted a presidential aide: "When your deficit is $100 billion a year, some people are going to wonder how serious you are about a balanced budget."

The proposal, sponsored by Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah, would require Congress to draw up a balanced budget every year unless three-fifths of the members of each chamber voted for deficit financing. Before becoming part of the Constitution, it must be approved by a two-thirds majority in both houses, then ratified by at least 38 states in seven years. The Senate Judiciary Committee approved the amendment last May by a vote of 11 to 5 (with nine Republicans and two Democrats voting for it). Hatch hopes a floor debate will begin late next month, but he concedes that the amendment will be "hotly contested," especially in the House, where the Democrats have kept it bottled up in the Judiciary Committee.

Reagan and Congress have been forced to consider the proposal seriously as an alternative to a far more frightening prospect: a constitutional convention called to pass a balanced-budget amendment, which could turn into a runaway meeting that might attempt to rewrite basic provisions of the Constitution. Congress is required to call such a convention when petitioned by the legislatures of two-thirds of the states; so far, 31 of the necessary 34 states have done so. Never before in U.S. history has there been such a convention, and there would be no legal way to prevent it from reconsidering any part of the Constitution. Even staunch opponents of the Hatch amendment regard his proposal as by far the lesser of two evils.

Meanwhile, the waltz over the 1983 budget plays on. White House Chief of Staff James Baker continued to meet privately with House and Senate leaders to see if a deal could be struck. He told them that the Administration was now projecting a 1983 budget deficit of $124 billion, up from $96.4 billion two months ago. Several options are being discussed, including the possibility that the Democrats will back trims in entitlement programs in exchange for Administration support for defense cuts. Baker has reportedly said that there is one non-negotiable item: the third year of tax reductions.

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