GovTrack’s Bill Summary
We don’t have a summary available yet.
H.R. 4314 (111th): To permit continued financing of Government operations.
- Introduced:
- Dec 15, 2009 (111th Congress, 2009–2010)
- Sponsor:
- Rep. Charles Rangel [D-NY15]
- Status:
- Signed by the President
- Slip Law:
- This bill became Pub.L. 111-123.
The bill’s title was written by the bill’s sponsor. H.R. stands for House of Representatives bill.
Library of Congress Summary
The summary below was written by the Congressional Research Service, which is a nonpartisan division of the Library of Congress.
12/28/2009--Public Law. (This measure has not been amended since it was introduced. The summary of that version is repeated here.) Increases the public debt limit from $12.104 trillion to $12.394 trillion.
House Republican Conference Summary
The summary below was written by the House Republican Conference, which is the caucus of Republicans in the House of Representatives.
This summary can be found at http://www.gop.gov/bill/111/1/hr4314.
Background
The statutory national debt limit sets the legal ceiling for how much money the federal government may borrow. The national debt combines both the total debt held by the public (money owed to U.S. debt holders) and intergovernmental holdings (debt held by the U.S. government in certain trust funds). According to the Department of Treasury, the current national debt is $12.071 trillion, or approximately $33 billion away from reaching the existing debt ceiling. According to press reports, the debt limit would have to be raised again before March, 2010.
The national debt was last extended from $11.315 trillion to $12.104 trillion when the Democrats dollar "stimulus" bill, just ten months ago. Since Democrats took control of Congress in January, 2007, the nation's debt has increased by 39 percent, from $8.670 trillion to $12.071 trillion. The House-passed budget for FY 2010 raised the limit to $13.223 trillion in 2010, or 9.2 percent above the current debt limit. Under the so-called "Gephardt rule," a debt limit attached to a budget resolution is deemed to have passed in the House, but the Senate must still pass the increase, which it has yet to do so. Initially, reports indicated that Democrats planned to increase the debt limit by $1.8 trillion, allowing them to borrow enough to pay for all their spending in 2010. Instead, Democrats now plan to pass a smaller increase that will need to be raised again, most likely in February.
If the debt limit is raised every by roughly $300 billion every two months for a year, that's equivalent to $1.8 trillion, or $15,413 per U.S. household, in increased national debt.
Summary
The bill would increase the statutory limit on the national debt by $290 billion, from $12.104 trillion to $12.394 trillion.
House Democratic Caucus Summary
The House Democratic Caucus does not provide summaries of bills.
So, yes, we display the House Republican Conference’s summaries when available even if we do not have a Democratic summary available. That’s because we feel it is better to give you as much information as possible, even if we cannot provide every viewpoint.
We’ll be looking for a source of summaries from the other side in the meanwhile.
The bill contains the following citations to other parts of U.S. law:
United States Code
The United States Code is the compilation of permanent laws enacted by Congress. Temporary and other non-permanent laws do not appear in the United States Code. (About half of the United States Code is the law itself, called positive law. The other half is merely a compilation of the laws but has no legal significance.)
- Title 31: MONEY AND FINANCE
- Subtitle III: FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT
- Chapter 31: PUBLIC DEBT
- Subchapter I: BORROWING AUTHORITY
- Section 3101: Public debt limit