Constitutional Fix to Overspending | Richard W. Rahn | Cato Institute: Commentary

Constitutional Fix to Overspending | Richard W. Rahn | Cato Institute: Commentary: "Tea Party members are going to be very unhappy. Many of the new members of the House and Senate that the Tea Party helped elect are already becoming part of the political class, as evidenced by their votes for continued farm subsidies, refusals to put reasonable limits on the growth of the food-stamp program, support for unaccountable international organizations, and on and on. Members of Congress vote for unjustified spending because they think the recipients will reward them with campaign contributions and praise while the majority of the electorate will never notice."

"The answer is to make it more difficult for the political class to spend and tax as much as it does but not make it so restrictive that government cannot spend sufficient funds on what is generally believed to be a constitutional and appropriate function of government. This can be accomplished best by having a constitutional amendment that requires both houses of Congress to pass all tax and spending bills with a supermajority — two-thirds of each chamber might be appropriate.

There already are many supermajority requirements, such as overrides of vetoes, so no new ground is being broken. In practice, what this would mean is that the special interests who want more spending or taxing will have a more difficult time rounding up the required numbers of votes, which means they will fail more often — all to the good. The supermajority requirement is not a panacea but will make it easier to reduce excessive spending and destructive deficits."