Adjourn on time

Here's some good advice for the South Carolina legislature: Don't raise taxes (unless it's on tobacco products) and don't expand the session beyond the June 5 adjournment date.

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It's possible to finish work on the state's $5.2 billion budget on time, says Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell, R-Charleston, but that would leave no time to deal with possible vetoes.

"If the General Assembly wants to handle vetoes, we'll have to have some extended veto session in June," he says.

McConnell and his colleagues should be red-faced at the very thought of staying in session beyond the scheduled time. The session is already about three months longer than it needs to be - and with the budget crisis the state's in, lawmakers should leave early anyway.

They'd save taxpayers about $25,000 a day; extending the session will instead cost taxpayers that much, thus exacerbating the very budget crisis they're supposed to be solving.

Moreover, legislators knew in January that writing a budget would be an especially tough task in this year of declining revenues - they should have planned ahead to finish it on time.

Some lawmakers, particularly among Senate Democrats, think they should raise various taxes and fees to get out of budget difficulties. When will politicians ever learn they can't tax their way to prosperity?

The problem in South Carolina, as in most states, isn't that the people are undertaxed, it's that the government is overspending. Instead of saving for a rainy day during the booming '90s, the state went on a spending spree it can no longer afford. To get out of the crisis, lawmakers must do what they're sent to Columbia to do: balance the budget by making the tough decisions of where to cut.

No one said it would be easy; nor did anyone say it couldn't be done on time.

--From the Friday, May 16, 2003 printed edition of the Augusta Chronicle