Application under Article V of the U.S. Constitution For a Convention to Propose a Balanced Budget Amendment and Further Fiscal Restraints

Application under Article V of the U.S. Constitution For a Convention to Propose a Balanced Budget Amendment and Further Fiscal Restraints

 Application under Article V of the U.S. Constitution For a Convention to Propose a Balanced Budget Amendment and Further Fiscal Restraints

Summary

The resolution will address a specific amendment to be voted on at an Article V Convention. The amendment would require that in the absence of a national emergency, total federal appropriations made by Congress for any fiscal year may not exceed the total of all estimated federal revenues for that fiscal year. The presently out-standing applications in many states regarding balanced budget applications are considered of the same subject matter. They shall be included with those outstanding amendments for the purpose of attaining two-thirds of states necessary to require the calling of a convention.

Model Resolution

Section 1. The legislature of the State of [INSERT STATE] hereby applies to Congress, under the provisions of Article V of the Constitution of the United States, for the calling of a convention of the states limited to proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States requiring that in the absence of a national emergency the total of all Federal appropriations made by the Congress for any fiscal year may not exceed the total of all estimated Federal revenues for that fiscal year, together with any related and appropriate fiscal restraints.

Section 2. The secretary of state is hereby directed to transmit copies of this application to the President and Secretary of the Senate and to the Speaker and Clerk of the House of Representatives of the Congress, and copies to the members of the said Senate and House of Representatives from this State; also to transmit copies hereof to the presiding officers of each of the legislative houses in the several States, requesting their cooperation.

Section 3. This application is to be considered as covering the same subject matter as the presently-outstanding balanced budget applications from other states, including but not limited to previously-adopted applications from Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and  Texas; and this application shall be aggregated with same for the purpose of attaining the two-thirds of states necessary to require the calling of a convention, but shall not be aggregated with any applications on any other subject..

Section 4. This application constitutes a continuing application in accordance with Article V of the Constitution of the United States until the legislatures of at least two-thirds of the several states have made applications on the same subject. It supersedes all previous applications by this legislature on the same subject.

 

Approved by the ALEC Board of Directors October 16, 2012.