Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act

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The Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act is a federal act of the United States that establishes the role of Congress in drawing up the budget .

Procedure for establishing the budget

The first nine sections of the law, collectively referred to as the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 , set out the process for establishing the budget. The second section prescribes the creation of the Congressional Budget Office . The third section describes the decision- making process for the budget, a concurrent resolution that is used as a basis for making decisions on the allocation of funds and does not require the approval of the President. With the help of special parliamentary funds, compliance with the budget can be enforced during the allocation process and the passing of the necessary laws can be accelerated.

These sections have been amended several times since they were first enacted, such as the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985 and the Budget Enforcement Act of 1990 . The requirements of the original law have been preserved to this day.

Withholding funds

Section 10 of the law gives the President the ability to ask Congress not to use certain allocated funds. If the Senate and House of Representatives do not agree to this request within 45 days, the funds must be used for the intended purpose. Congress is free to vote on these requests, and in most cases it has so far ignored them.

This rule was introduced in response to President Nixon's repeated refusal to use funds.

As a counter-reaction, a line item veto has repeatedly been proposed, but has so far been unsuccessful , which would enable the President to remove certain expenditure items from laws. Federal law allowing this option was passed in the 1998 Clinton v. City of New York declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court .

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