Committing fiscal policy

Several senators, led by Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) and Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), want a commission established to study the nation’s finances in light of tax policy and spending, particularly on entitlements.

The senators and their colleagues Evan Bayh (D-Ind.), Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), George Voinovich (R-Ohio), Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) are putting pressure on commission opponents, notably House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Their leverage is to say they will vote for a necessary increase in the national debt limit only if the legislation includes language establishing the commission and stipulating that its recommendation will get an up-or-down vote in both chambers of Congress.

The national debt is likely to reach its $12.1 trillion ceiling by mid-December. The House has approved raising it to $13 trillion, which would require yet another hike in about May or June. The Senate could set a higher limit and get House agreement in conference, kicking the next hike further down the road.

The conjunction of a higher debt limit and a fiscal commission is a mildly ironic variant on the Augustinian prayer about being made good but not yet. There are many fine people in Congress, and they want to govern well, but they do not trust themselves as a body to be fiscally prudent.

Conrad and Gregg note that standing committees have watched the rising red ink for decades but have been unwilling or unable to stop the tide.

This is why they are seeking a remedy outside regular order.

Whether this is a good idea (and financial stability is surely more advisable than the road to ruin), it remains troubling that Congress, the purse keeper, should need to contract out the task of formulating fiscal policy.

Politicians are as likely as anyone to want to leave tough decisions to others. And short of being able to shrug off a responsibility entirely, it is easier to act in a given way if you can say you had little choice, that your hands were tied, that you would have changed things if change were permissible. Gregg and Conrad know this and are trying to make it easier for lawmakers to vote for fiscal prudence — hence their demand for the up-or-down votes.

But Pelosi and others can argue with force that Congress should be unfettered in deciding tax and spending policy — that is what it’s elected to do — and should not slough off its responsibilities, powers and privileges in this way.

It would be easier to argue this in principle if Congress had not already contracted out some of its powers and privileges, such as with the creation of an Office of Congressional Ethics (which this newspaper argued against). That body, only a year old, is already causing buyers’ remorse on Capitol Hill.

A commission on taxes and spending would presumably not become a standing body, but it is regrettable that even a temporary usurpation of congressional latitude may be necessary.