The Balanced Budget Amendment is a bad policy response to the 2011 debt issue.

The ResolutionPro has picked an excellent debate topic. A Balanced Budget Amendment (BBA) deserves serious consideration, and I'm looking forward to our debate giving it the attention it deserves. Pro said that he would consider the Senate version of the BBA [1. http://www.heritage.org...], which is what I will do. The Amendment has eleven sections which I'll refer to a S1 ... S11, respectively.Pro points out that that there are relatively minor differences between the House and Senate versions and properly considers the differences not to be critical to the debate. I agree. In fact, the resolution is whether a balanced budget amendment is appropriate, not whether the exact language of either the House or Senate version could be improved upon. Proponents of a BBA have proposed a starting point for negotiation of the exact wording. Boehner's most recent proposal passed in the House for solving the debt crisis didn't say what balanced budget amendment had to be voted on, just that some balanced budget amendment had to be voted on. It did not required that an Amendment be approved, just voted upon. The resolution asserts that any talk of a BBA in conjunction with the debt issue is "inappropriate." "Inappropriate" could mean that it should not be spoken of in front of liberals, just as certain offensive language is inappropriate when speaking with your Grandma. However, I'll just stick to policy issues. First, I will respond to Pro's case.Pro 1: No way to stop near-term downgrading.This is false under any version of the BBA. A BBA would have to be ratified by three-quarters of the state legislatures before taking effect. Recent amendments have been taking about two-years to ratify [2. http://en.wikipedia.org... ] Some state legislature only meet every other year. However, S11 of the proposed BBA says that "This article shall take effect beginning with the fifth fiscal year beginning after its ratification." (The House version is two years after ratification.) So Congress would be able to operate under current rules for about seven years. Moreover S5 allows "The limit on the debt of the United States shall not be increased, unless three-fifths of the duly chosen and sworn Members ..." Currently, it takes a 60% vote to increase the debt limit in the Senate, so the change is that the House approval is increased from 50% to 60%. That's a stiff requirement, but certainly not an insurmountable one in the case of true national emergency. For example, the TARP bailout of the banks passed with over 60% in both the House and the Senate. [3. http://www.huffingtonpost.com...]Pro 2: BBA UnenforceablePro made no case, so I need not respond. S10 provides: "The Congress shall have power to enforce and implement this article by appropriate legislation, ..." That simply allows the BBA to be put into law through specific procedures. So the question is then how can Constitutional limits on the power of the legislature be enforced. First of all, we expect elected legislators sworn to uphold the Constitution to obey the Constitution whether there is additional threat of enforcement or not. A legislator ho fails to do so could be recalled by his state. Second, we have similar restrictions on powers other than the power to spend, and those restrictions are enforced by Court order. The First Amendment starts "Congress shall make no law ..." If congress makes a law against free speech, the Judiciary strikes it down. Similarly, the Courts can invalidate excessive spending. There is precedent with the 49 states that have balanced budget amendments. The State legislature go through all manner of accounting tricks to try to evade the requirements of the State constitutions, and the state courts determine what is legal and what is not. Pro 3: Unrealistic near term cutsAs previously established, full cuts are not required for about seven years. There are no unrealistic near-term cuts. In the long term, entitlements would indeed have to be cut. However, that is inescapable in any case. The growth in debt and entitlements will consume the entire GDP if nothing is done. The BBA forces proper action before a crisis is reached in entitlements. Pro 4: Vulnerability to recessionWhat causes recessions? Politicians want to overspend to get votes from constituents, and whoever is in office wants to spend to keep as much stimulus as possible. Required fiscal sobriety will prevent severe recessions in the first place. Not overspending in the first place removes the corrections of deep recessions.The states that have balanced budget amendments cope with downturns through the use of "rainy day funds." [4. http://en.wikipedia.org... ] There is no prohibition on running surpluses and saving them for bad times. That's a much better mechanism than relying on debt. Private insurance companies do not rely upon debt to handle claims in bad years (as with hurricanes) they build equity to draw upon.There is some ambiguity as to whether spending from past savings is an "outlay" under the Amendment. It's probably not, because state BBAs do not consider it so. If so, then it should be made clear that saved funds are allowed. The debate question here is whether a BBA is inherently bad policy.In the worst times, in takes 60% of both houses to increase the debt limit. That's prudent, but it provides an escape.Pro 5: Alternative mechanismsCongress might just choose on it's own to stop excessive spending. That has not happened. The CATO proposal is to allow the President to have a line-item veto in yeas with deficits. So, for example, President Obama could go in and cut all the wild spending programs of which he disapproves. The problem with that is that aren't any wild spending programs of which he disapproves. There never has been and never will be. The alternative does not approach the fundamental problem: politicians get re-electing by spending. A line item veto requires a Constitutional amendment. If it worked to provide a balanced budget, it would therefore be a BBA.Con 1: Fixes a flaw in democracyA flaw in democracy was observed by Edmund Burke in 1754 (my emphasis):A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largess from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. [5.http://www.americantraditions.org... ]The source gives many quotes from the Founders expressing similar sentiments. The cure to this problem was envisioned by Burke and by the Founders to be a constitutional republic, in which democracy worked within constraints o power established by a Constitution. Jefferson favored a balanced budget amendment. [6. http://www.csmonitor.com...] The time has arrived for a limit embodied in the Constitution. We can debate the details, but the problem is fundamental. Con 2: The BBA discussion is appropriate because it addresses chronic deficitsRaising the debt ceiling does not ensure that the US will have sound fiscal policies. It does not even ensure that the US will preserve the AAA credit rating on its debt, because the long term outlook is so poor. [7. http://economicsnewspaper.com...]The reason a BBA is appropriate to the discussion is that it addresses the real problem, which is chronic overspending by government. That's good even if a BBA is not passed.