A line-item veto: President Bill Clinton possessed that power for the first two years that he was in office. He lopped off about two billion dollars from one billion, although such a sum was a mere rounding error then, and now it would be a bare smudge. The Supreme Court later struck down this power, arguing that the President's authority to cut spending impinged on the legislative powers of Congress.
Yet how does Congress justify the TARP legislation, which all but handed $700 billion dollars to President George W. Bush to spend as he saw fit?
Still, encoding a line-item veto in the United States Constitution would be a reasonable step toward curbing some of the outrageous spending that has crept into our country's finances.
Certainly legislators would not be inclined to grant an executive, who may be the head of the opposition, power to rewrite their own legislation. If enough supporters throughout the country pressured their lawmakers to grant this authority through the Constitution, and could make the case to the several states that such a move would invariably save them money, perhaps even remit federal taxes which need to be returned to the states, then a persuasive moment could push for its implementation.
Fiscal conservatism demands responsibility and resolve, something that an executive can demonstrate without offending his base or alienating members of Congress. By standing as a decisive check to a spendthrift legislature, a president could strength his presence as chief executive and command respect with voters in future elections.
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