The “Deeming Resolution”: A Budget Enforcement Tool

Megan Suzanne Lynch
Analyst on Congress and the Legislative Process

“Deeming resolution” is a term that refers to legislation deemed to serve as an annual budget resolution for purposes of establishing enforceable budget levels for a budget cycle. A deeming resolution is used when the House and Senate have not agreed on a budget resolution .

The Congressional Budget Act of 1974 provides for the annual adoption of a budget resolution establishing aggregate levels of revenues, spending, the debt limit, and the surplus or deficit, as well as allocations of spending. Enforcement of the budget resolution relies primarily upon points of order and reconciliation procedures. With regard to the enforcement of budget aggregates and committee spending allocations, the major points of order are found in Sections 311 and 302 of the act, respectively. The term “deeming resolution” is not officially defined, nor is there any specific statute or rule authorizing such legislation. Instead, the use of a deeming resolution simply represents the House and Senate employing regular legislative procedures to deal with the issue on an ad hoc basis.

The form and content of a deeming resolution is not prescribed, so it may be shaped to meet the particular needs at hand. For example, the House and Senate have used simple resolutions as the legislative vehicle in the past, but a deeming resolution may be incorporated into a bill, such as an annual appropriations act, as a single provision. At a minimum, deeming resolutions provide new spending allocations to the Appropriations Committees, but they also may set new aggregate budget levels, provide revised spending allocations to other House and Senate committees, or provide for other related purposes.

For purposes of this report, a distinction is drawn between instances in which the budget resolution was adopted in a tardy manner and deeming resolutions were employed in the interim before a budget resolution was finally agreed to and, alternately, those instances when the House and Senate never reached final agreement on a budget resolution and deeming resolutions were used as an alternative enforcement mechanism instead. This report deals largely with those years in which the House and Senate did not reach final agreement on a budget resolution. The relevant fiscal years were FY1999, FY2003, FY2005, FY2007, FY2011, and FY2012.

For the upcoming FY2013, the House has agreed to H.Res. 614, a special rule deeming the House-passed budget resolution, H.Con.Res. 112, as enforceable, pending the adoption by the House and Senate of a budget resolution for FY2013. On March 20, 2012, Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad filed in the Congressional Record FY2013 discretionary spending limits enforceable in the Senate, as provided under Section 106(b)(2) of the Budget Control Act (BCA; P.L. 112-25), which have been referred to as a “deeming resolution.”


Date of Report: May 2, 2012
Number of Pages: 33
Order Number: RL31443
Price: $29.95

Follow us on TWITTER at http://www.twitter.com/alertsPHP or #CRSreports

Document available via e-mail as a pdf file or in paper form.
To order, e-mail Penny Hill Press or call us at 301-253-0881. Provide a Visa, MasterCard, American Express, or Discover card number, expiration date, and name on the card. Indicate whether you want e-mail or postal delivery. Phone orders are preferred and receive priority processing.