Replies

rustbucket: "Republicans had effective control of the House in the 1860-1861 session.
That session of Congress basically proposed increasing the government debt from almost 70 million to 250 million."

To pay for the Civil War Federal spending rose from its historical average of around 2% of GDP in 1860 to peak at 13% of GDP in 1865, while national debt rose from $65 million in 1860 to nearly $3 billion in 1866, then about 33% of GDP.

It took until 1880 to reduce spending below 3% of GDP and until 1890 to get the national debt down to 10% of GDP.
Those numbers never fully returned to pre-war averages.

By stark contrast, today's Federal spending & debt are both way off the charts.