The Budget

On or before the first Monday in February of each year, the President is required to submit his annual budget request to the Congress.  The President’s budget document is a voluminous statement of policy priorities, detailed funding requests for individual federal programs and analyses of federal spending, trade balances and deficits.  While the Administration’s budget document is only a request of Congress, it shows the Administration’s support for, or opposition to, individual programs and is used as a benchmark for all subsequent proposals.  How strongly members of Congress and stakeholders react to proposed cuts in funding (or praise new initiatives) serves as an early sign to the Appropriations and Budget Committees of public support for key programs.

By mid-spring, the House and Senate Budget Committees pass the annual Budget Resolution setting a broad framework for federal spending across all areas of government.  The Budget Resolution sets an overall cap on discretionary spending and allocates dollars among 21 areas of government spending, such as national defense, agriculture, the administration of justice, and transportation.  How those overall dollar figures are divvied up among the various programs under those functional areas is the job of the Appropriations Committees later in the summer and fall. 

So while the Budget Resolution is only the first step in the very lengthy federal funding process, it is important because once the overall spending levels are set and divided among the appropriations bills, the competition for dollars narrows to within each of the individual appropriations bill, making it nearly impossible to get money from one functional area (i.e., defense) to offset new spending in another (i.e., justice).  That’s why NCJA works hard to ensure that the Budget Committees “make enough room” for JAG, COPS and the other priority programs in the Budget Resolution.

In this section, you will find the text of the Budget Resolution, NCJA’s letters to Congress, other groups’ letters to Congress and information about the President's budget proposal.