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Bf Rep. Burr P. Harrison
J The suggestion that checks of ,! might be returned marked “no funds’* -would impress most> citizens as little short of ridiculous but that Was the prospect placed before us in Congress during committee consideration of the President’s request for an increase in the national debt limit. * ; There are a few economic theorists who contend that debt limits, ate unnecessary—that we should borrow and spend for whatever we think we need without thought of Si ceiling. For the most part, however, the idea of an inevitable steady * increase ’ in our national debt is distasteful,‘both to the financial experts and to the average Citizens whose only contact with thf problem is-in trying to rtiake ends meet after paying the federal taxes, ’ ' , » , ,! It was natural, therefore, that ihe House Committee on Ways find Means, on which’ I am privileged to serve, wanted to know gust why the President found it ^necessary to ask the Congress to let him place thfe country in debt for more than the present limit of ?S£75 billion. It should be remerobfered that "the debt limit is not the same thing as the budget. The budget is what the Federal Government proposes to spend—and ; experts to take in—"in a given fiscal year. The debt limit controls how much credit the Government may use at any given time to borrow funds for old and new expenses. : > * Secretary of the Treasury Robert B. Anderson told us the Treasury had been operating on a very small balance in recent weeks. He explained that it had been writing checks for large amounts, in many cases, without sufficient funds on hand at the moment to coyer all of them, but in the expectation that die steady incoming flow of tax receiptsAvould provide the money to honor the checks when they came back for payment. At one point, it was said, the Tretsury was cutting it so close that a threedav irrterruption in the receipt of Federal income at anticipated levels—such as could be caused by a sever* ^transportation tie-up due to weather or strike—would cause some Treasury checks to be dishonored.
This heavy reliance on anticipated revenue to cover checks is not far removed from the practice' qf “kiting” checks on . which the law * frowns Severely.
It became evident, therefore, that some action was indicated, if current spending rates were to be continued,, to preserve the credit of the United States. The figures presented gave reason to doubt, however, that the $5 billion boost in the debt ceiling requested by die'
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