Last week the Center for Freedom & Prosperity joined with the National Taxpayers Union and 17 other groups to warn Republican leaders against making the mistake of undoing the sequester cuts. The letter notes:
The BCA established limits on discretionary spending through FY 2021 including a cap of $967 billion for FY 2014. While the law is imperfect, the spending caps are perhaps the biggest policy victory in recent years for advocates of limited government.
This echoes arguments made by Dan Mitchell, who has noted that the sequester is an under-appreciated success for those who want to limit government. Simply put, it halted the excessive growth of government spending. Spending is still unacceptably high despite flat-lining, but since the first step to getting out of any hole is to stop digging, the sequester was an important first step.
Maintaining the sequester should thus be an important goal for fiscal conservatives. The letter concludes:
If Congress reneges on promises to restrain spending just two years after the passage of discretionary spending caps, it would send a powerful message to the American people: Congress cannot control its profligate spending. This could, in turn, jeopardize other important conservative priorities, as well as the prospect for economic prosperity. Thus, we believe maintaining post-sequester BCA caps should be of the utmost importance.
