The ancient Greeks would on occasion pass a law forbidding any further debate on some issue that had been decided. The reason for this was to prevent critics from undermining the policy, by endlessly debating the issue after a course of action has been agreed upon by the people. For example, a decision to go to war with another polos would be decided and no further debate permitted. If someone tried to revive the debate, they would be killed or expelled from the city. It was not a matter taken lightly.
It was a clever way to prevent second guessing and indecision, but it is also a way to lock in bad policy. The rule becomes a suicide pact. An example is how Massachusetts recently passed a gas tax that is pegged to the CPI. That means the tax goes up every year without any action by the legislature. Another example is how the US Congress has their pay automatically increase along with all federal salaries. The whole point is they don’t have to answer for their votes every election.
In theory, no legislature can bind a future legislature. The reason people say this is whatever is passed this year by the legislature, can be reversed by subsequent legislatures. For example, if the Congress passes a law promising to pay you a fixed amount of money every year, this can be reversed in the next Congress. That said, as with the Greek example, a legislature can make it really hard for future legislatures to undo their work. The American welfare state is the most obvious example.
Congress is poised to do soemthing that will be close to impossible to unwind. They are seeking to have the debt limit increase automatically every year, unless Congress passes a bill forbidding it. Further, if a future Congress tried to halt the debt ceiling hike, the president could veto the bill. This, in effect, give the executive power of the purse, as the government can always borrow, even if Congress refuses to tax. It turns on its head the political relationship between Congress and the executive.
The reason for this change, of course, is to prevent the minority in Congress from putting the brakes on the excesses of the majority. The handful of spending hawks left in Congress made life unpleasant for the establishment every time they have to raise the det ceiling, so the establishment is taking that lever away from them. Leadership will not have to be embarrassed when they are out lying to the public about how much they care about the deficit and the spending. Borrowing is now on autopilot.
In popular government, the power of the purse is in the hands of the parliament. Article I, Section 8, Clause 1 of the United States Constitution, is known as the Taxing and Spending Clause. It explicitly gives the power to tax to Congress. “The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States.”
The power to borrow, as we see, also lies with Congress. They authorize all debt. After all, government borrowing in popular government is a form of taxation. The legislature is making a promise to pay on behalf of the people, a promise to pay with interest. This is an indirect tax. Similarly, government borrowing raises the cost of private borrowing. That’s also a tax on the people. For Congress to have the debt limit automatically rise, without Congressional oversight, is handing tax power to the executive.
This is one of those small things historians will look back on as evidence of the decay in the American political class. The House is the most democratic body and it is the most populist body. In theory, at least. As the House slowly abandons its authority to the executive, the people slowly lose influence over government. The executive requires an ever expanding army of bureaucrats to administer the state. The people become subjects, ruled over by that permanent bureaucracy of overseers tasked with keeping control.
History is full of examples of this. There’s something natural about the how democracy slowly gives way to some form of authoritarianism. It suggests people, over time, prefer to be subjects rather than citizens. America will be just one more example. The question is whether it is first a bureaucratic authoritarianism or some collection of interests, like a combination of the security state and Big tech, just seizes power. Maybe we end up with a strong man put in power by global corporate interests.
Either way, it will not end well.
