You know about the frog in the pot of slowly heating water?

I’m reminded of the metaphor by House Republican Leader Bruce Westerman’s bill, filed yesterday and with a herd of Republican co-sponsors, to arbitrarily cap state spending increases by 3 percent a year, or, if the three-year spending average has been less than 3 percent, that lower figure.

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In spirit, at least, it runs afoul of the Constitutional prohibition against obligating state money beyond the current legislature — in reverse. Future legislatures would be, of course, able to exceed that limit by voting a repeal. But it would be powerfully difficult.

States don’t wage war — Texas, perhaps, excepted — and so we don’t have the war analogy used on the artificial means proposed to restrict federal spending, such as a balanced budget amendment. But revenues and needs can change dramatically. God forbid the state experience a sudden upturn in the economy, or be poised for one if only the state would invest $1 billion in a steel mill. Whether needs were an increase in the school population, a desperate need for shoring up nursing homes or an unexpected capital project, a legislature’s hands would be tied. And, as we’ve seen, the need for only a 25 percent vote to block an appropriations bill means a tiny band of frog-boiling, anti-government absolutists could stymie the noblest of ideas.

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Needless to say this nasty little bill would also put the quietus on any future significant tax increases for perceived needs. What’s the point of raising a tax if you can’t spend the additional revenue?

Those new charter school regulation commissions cost money.

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UPDATE: John Lyon if Stephens Media has a good report on this. The Beebe administration will fight the bill and already has a report on constitutional and practical problems with the bill.

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