Business: Brown vs. the Board

In the past few weeks, California Governor Jerry Brown has phoned five members of TIME'S Board of Economists. Why, he asked, did they oppose his call for a constitutional convention to devise an amendment that would force Congress to balance the budget? Recalls one of the economists: "When you say to him, 'Look, it just doesn't make a damn bit of sense,' his comeback is, 'Yes, but I want some amendment in the Constitution that reflects fiscal responsibility.' " The California legislature, by a vote of 12 to 8 in its ways and means committee, declined last week to join the...