The House Budget Committee, under the leadership of U.S. Rep. Tom Price (R-GA), released a working paper on Tuesday outlining committee efforts to revamp the Congressional Budget Act of 1974.
The paper resulted from a hearing that Price, the chairman of the House Budget Committee, convened in May to explore ways to reclaim congressional authority through the “power of the purse.”
“A government’s budgeting system is central to determining the kind of governing system a country has,” the paper states. “Hence, a vigorous practice of budgeting is fundamental to Congress’s policymaking authority under Article I of the Constitution….To the extent Congress cedes control of the budget, the executive branch – which is independent of Congress – gains power, undermining the Constitution’s carefully drawn balance of powers. The founders established this constitutional system precisely to prevent such concentrations of power, which would ultimately threaten individual freedoms.”
The committee’s working paper address four main themes – budget and governing, constitutional authority for power of the purse, current budget practices that undermine congressional authority, and restoration of constitutional government.
“No single activity consumes as much of Congress’s time as budgeting — choosing priorities and allocating financial resources accordingly,” the paper concludes. “These are among the most fundamental ways for a legislature to shape governing policies. Moreover, the budget process amounts to a direct exercise of the form of government a country has. In the United States, the budget system is essential to maintaining the federal government’s arrangement of three separate but coequal branches. The budget process must reinforce basic constitutional principles.”