Word: Debt Ceiling
Definition: The statutory authority given by
the Congress to the U.S. Treasury to borrow a certain amount of
money and/or issue securities to fund the operations of the federal
government.
Used in a sentence: "After the Debt-Ceiling Breach: What Day 1 in
Default America Might Look Like"
History: According to the Congressional Budget Office, Congress long has
restricted the Department of Treasury's ability to issue debt
and has exercised control over the total amount of borrowing.
However, until the summer of 2011, raising the debt ceiling
traditionally had been a pro forma occurrence without much policy
debate or partisanship in the Congress. The "debt
ceiling crisis" that occurred in the summer of 2011 was a
political debate and battle between Congressional Republicans and
President Obama. The Republicans generally were refusing to
increase the federal government's authority to borrow money
without taking steps contemporaneously to
