Sec. 4007. Sense of the Senate on treatment of reduction of appropriations levels to achieve savings
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Congress finds the following: H. Con. Res. 448 (96th Congress), the concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 1981, gave authorizing committees reconciliation instructions which amounted to approximately two-thirds of the savings required under reconciliation. The language in H. Con. Res. 448 resulted in a debate about how reconciling discretionary spending programs could be in order given that authorizations of appropriations for programs did not actually change spending and the programs authorized would be funded through later annual appropriation.
The staff of the Committee on the Budget of the Senate and the counsel to the Majority Leader advised that upon consultation with the Parliamentarian, the original instructions on discretionary spending would be out of order because of the phrase, to modify programs . This was seen as too broad and programs could be modified without resulting in changes to their future appropriations. To rectify this violation, the Committee on the Budget of the Senate reported S. Con. Res. 9 (97th Congress), revising the congressional budget for the United States Government for fiscal years 1981, 1982, and 1983, to include reconciliation, which revised the language in the reconciliation instructions to change entitlement law and to report changes in laws within the jurisdiction of that committee sufficient to reduce appropriations levels so as to achieve savings .
This was understood to mean changes in authorization language of discretionary programs would be permissible under reconciliation procedures provided such changes in law would have the result in affecting a change in later outlays derived from future appropriations. Further it was understood that a change in authorization language that caused a change in later outlays was considered to be a change in outlays for the purpose of reconciliation. On April 2, 1981, the Senate voted 88 to 10 to approve S.
Con. Res. 9 with the modified reconciliation language. It is the sense of the Senate that committees reporting changes in laws within the jurisdiction of that committee sufficient to reduce appropriations levels so as to achieve savings shall be considered to be changes in outlays for the purpose of enforcing the prohibition on extraneous matters in reconciliation bills.