End of the Budget Amendment [Withdrawn]

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

I will pledge to vote for this Amendment if the Senate can cocurrently pass a bill requiring the Senate to pass a budget outside of the constitution where,

(1) Senate business does not grind to a halt when budgetary matters are being discussed,
(2) The Senate is empowered to define what goes into the budget, making it independent of having a GM, and
(3) Require the Senate to pass a budget "from time to time," as we have now required a State of the Union address to be given "from time to time."

I do not think the Senate should abandon the budget process entirely.  Give those of us who wish to try and pass a budget the tools to do so.  As things currently stand, we are constitutionally unable to pass a legit budget.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

If no one has anything further to add, I will move for a final vote in twenty-four hours. Though I can't imagine that debate on this isn't more contentious. Perhaps people are just sick of discussing the Budget.

I think it's the latter, and the fact that this bill just got lost in the shuffle a bit.  I'll introduce an amendment tomorrow.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution is hereby amended to read:

Section 8: Budget
1. The Senate shall be responsible for drafting and approving a Budget from time to time, as determined by the membership of the body.
2. The Senate shall be empowered to decide what will be included in each Budget, and what may be excluded.
3. The Senate shall be empowered to decide how and where Atlasia derives each year's economic figures (such as GDP estimates, estimates of tax revenue, or needed additional appropriations, etc.).
4. The Senate shall continue to conduct ordinary business while discussion of each budget continues.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

The proposed amendment essentially eliminates the budget requirement in the same manner with which we eliminated the State of the Union requirement, while empowering those of us who wish to attempt a budget the power and ability to do so.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

This amendment only legalizes what we've already been doing for almost 2 years. Thusly, the passing of this amendment is, in fact, the killing of this bill secretly. I will vote against the amendment, and urge my fellow senators to do the same.

No, it actually makes us legally able to draft a budget.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

Aye.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

YES! Freedom wins! (I think)

Not yet.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

I volunteer to pick up sponsorship, then.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

*sigh*

Speed of Sound, for someone who complained monstrously about the Senate not doing anything about the budget, you are certainly being obstructionist about it.

Anyway, Senators have forty-eight hours to volunteer to assume sponsorship, more or less.

I wanna kill this bill because I wanted to kill the budget. I hate this new bill because any senator can work on the budget whenever NOW.

100% incorrect.  To work on the budget, Atlasia would require a GM, because such a rule is enshrined in the constitution.  Any budget worked on and passed without a GM would rightly be declared unconstitutional.  I refuse to further work on a budget until it is legal to do so, because I do not want the work (that I am more than willing to do) get thrown  out the window by people like SoS and Ebowed.

We cannot have a budget, because the constitution does not allow us to have a budget because of the wording of the provision requiring us to have a budget.  It's a painfully bad way to have something in the constitution.

Fix it.  Don't just sit there.  Do something to make the situation better.  If my attempt at the budget fails, then I will gladly switch sides and kill the budget indefinitely.  But I'm unwilling to write it off until I'm given the opportunity to try.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

I suppose the good news is that even if a bill gets withdrawn with objections raised to assumptions of sponsorship, the new PPT Discretion slot can get the bill right back to the Senate floor with a new sponsor within mere days.