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The Q nobody has asked until today: Amending Non-Existent Law In the House

By: ehud (Diary)  |  March 20th, 2010 at 01:58 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Apparently the Rules committee is in Chaos over whether or not the house can vote on an amendment to non-existing law (the Senate bill). I have brought this point up a few times in comment threads, but I haven’t read any articles about what seems a very obvious point:

If the Senate can’t start reconciliation until the Senate bill is law (since reconciliation must amend existing law according to the parliamentarian) then how can the House start reconciliation on something that isn’t law? In fact, they are trying to start reconciliation on a bill that hasn’t even passed the house.

What they want to do is amend a bill and vote on an amended bill, which happens all the time. But doesn’t that require 2 votes: a vote on the amendment and then a vote on the final bill? And in that case doesn’t the amended bill have to go back to the Senate?

Where is the House parliamentarian and how can the house parliamentarian make a ruling that is inconsistent with the Senate parliamentarian?

AND HOW COME NO REPORTERS OR COMMENTATORS HAVE BROUGHT UP THIS PROBLEM YET?

According to Byron York’s linked post, it seems like the rules committee hasn’t even realized this problem until today.

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COMMENTS

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  • acat

    Like the more famous Schr?dinger’s cat, which remains in an indeterminate state between live and dead until it’s observed, the Slaughter Rule creates a similar indeterminate state.

    The bill is a “law” as far as the Senate is concerned because they can’t get to 60, so must use reconciliation, and that can only be done on existing laws .. but ..

    The bill is a “non-law” as far as the House is concerned until the Senate acts. That way, the House Dem pragmatists (I would say cowards) can claim they did not vote “for” it if the Senate opts to do nothing.

    The real question, though, is whether Obama will sign the part of it, the Senate bill without House fixes. If he does, then the bill is “law” as far as the IRS is concerned, the Dems in the House are doomed (erm, sorry, DOOMed) and the lawsuits will be flying.

    Even Schr?dinger’s cat will, eventually, die of old age.

    Mew

    • JSobieski

      and that the vote will be straight up. That does buy them 1 Y vote, but it may cost them others.

      • proudgop

        they have dropped deem and pass and will vote separate vote on Senate bill first

      • Swamp_Yankee

        With guys like Cardoza jumping, they may have not had the votes for Slaughter, or they may feel just as confident about a straight vote.

        • eburke

          read the tea leaves.

          If there’s a hint of what may be used to try to bring over the Stupak group it would be that Lipinski said that whether they get legislative or executive action on the aborion question that’ll work for them. Pelosi made comments about perhaps Obama issuing a signing statement or an excecutive order using Stupak language. So we’ll see.

          While the use of the Slaughter Solution *might* have possibly gained us a judicial firewall against this POS, by dropping it, the best thing that happens is there are enough Dems who won’t vote for the Senate billl that it get defeated; the worst thing is that it gives a crystal clear picture of which Dems were in favor of this abominiaton.

        • acat

          It means the Dems are afraid enough that they aren’t going to start messing too obviously.

          It means that the heat is on.

          It does not, however, mean that the health insurance takeover is going to go down in flames.

          Somehow, since it’s the signature plank Obama has chosen to hang his reputation on, even if Nancy can’t get the votes by Sunday, this takeover is going forward.

          His next angle likely involves using federal agencies to punish insurers, driving rates up, and driving as many insurers into the red and out of the game as possible.

          If he can do so without getting called out for it, this would increase the demand for “government regulation of health care costs”.

          Mew

  • swami7774

    …the Red Queen has her votes, probably an extra 2 or 3–so that no Dem will have to fend off “he was the vote that approved this mess” rhetoric this fall.

    Or it means they are in chaos and don’t have a clue what they’re doing.

  • renny

    is not the last vote and does not make the Sen. bill law. He says it must return to the Sen. for a vote, and then be returned to the House again.

    Now, If Obamanation signs something, evidently the procedures are not what are really required for a “legal” law.

    You can tell that this concoction must be even WORSE, more taxing, and more controlling than we have any idea because little o and his minions WANT it so much.

    The deal is something like Ilsa in Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade. She can’t quite reach the fallen Grail cup and loses her grip on both Indiana and reality to plunge to her doom. After, Indiana’s father says Ilsa never really understood the Grail. She thought she had won a prize, and that’s what little o thinks.

    O believes is he can stand in the Rose garden and hand out signing pens that he?s won the brass ring. But, in the end, he will lose the control of Congress and he has spent so much focus and capital on this one idiot bill that there will be no will or interest even among Dems. to pass anything else in such a conflicted and oppositional fashion.

    The chickens always come home to roost.

  • proudgop

    That means there will be three votes on Sunday: “First, on a resolution that will set the terms of debate. Second, on a package of amendments to the Senate bill that have been demanded by House members. And third, on the Senate bill itself.”

    So another words every dem who votes with this is ok with being prostitute for Nelson of Nebraska