Read It Before the Vote Bill Introduced in House
A much-needed piece of legislation has been introduced by U.S. Representative Brian Baird, dealing with an institutional barrier to citizen activism on congressional issues. Anyone who’s spent much time trying to track legislation going through Congress knows that there are roughly three paths that it can take: 1st, there’s legislation that’s introduced and then ignored; 2nd, there’s legislation that struggles its way slowly to passage; and 3rd, there’s legislation that is introduced and then passed in the blink of an eye.
Some of the worst legislation, dealing with the most important issues of the day, gets passed in the 3rd way. Remember how the Patriot Act, with its many provisions cutting away at our constitutional rights, was passed before anyone in Congress actually had the chance to read the legislation? That happens all too often, and when members of Congress don’t have the opportunity to read legislation before voting on it, citizen activists don’t stand a chance of making a meaningful statement.
Brian Baird’s legislation, H. Res. 554, would change all that. It would require that House legislation be online, available for people to read, for 72 hours – not counting weekends and holidays. Those three days would give citizens the chance to call their representatives in Washington D.C., and let their opinions be known. It also would establish a needed waiting period for members of the House, in which they could actually read the legislation they are asked to vote on.
Sadly, it looks like H. Res. 554 might become one of that first category of legislation in Congress: Introduced and then ignored. So far, there’s only one cosponsor of the bill, Representative John Culberson. It seems that most members of Congress aren’t very concerned with the trouble citizens have with gaining access to legislation before it is voted upon. Perhaps, some members of Congress actually prefer for their legislation to be remain inaccessible to us common folk.
