Hill letter: federal budget

Balance the federal budget? Sounds great — and needed. Term limits? Surely that would help the Washington mess. Many problems need solving.

We are being told that to accomplish these things requires an Article V Constitutional Convention. I submit that using a very permanent solution for what can be temporary problems is like choosing suicide to solve a toothache. The answer is not a Constitutional Convention to rewrite or amend the document but rather requiring our government to abide by the original Constitution.

There are already guidelines for balancing the budget; we should insist that our lawmakers follow them. Those things that are outside the constitutionally granted responsibilities must be taken off the “funded” list.

If a new Constitutional Convention is convened, it is likely to follow the precedent set by the first convention. Remember, in 1787 the original convention was to amend and make workable the Articles of Confederation. After the convention began, and behind closed doors, the Articles were deemed unusable and tossed aside in favor of writing a whole new document. We cannot take a chance that our current Constitution will be discarded or rewritten in like manner. I urge a stand against approving a Constitutional Convention.

This story was originally published March 7, 2016 at 11:42 PM with the headline "Hill letter: federal budget."