ABSTRACT
Washington's continuing inability to deal with federal deficits of about $200 billion a year renews the determination of those of us who support a constitutional amendment requiring a balanced federal budget to press our case even more vigorously during the current congressional session. Thirty-two state legislatures have called for a constitutional convention to adopt a balanced-budget amendment. In 1982 Congress came close to approving the amendment, when more than two-thirds of the members of the Senate and more than a majority in the House voted for inserting a balanced-budget requirement into the Constitution. "A balanced budget amendment would be 'more loophole than law' and could be easily circumvented." The last attempt to establish guidelines for such a "political process," the 1974 Budget Reform Act, has given us nothing but mounting deficits, higher interest rates, a huge negative trade balance and further discredit to the governmental process.
