They need to read the Bills themselves not have their staff read it and tell them what is in it. Less Bills!
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I agree with almost everyone here. One subject, one Bill. No “pork belly”.
They are used for pet projects anyway. AND NO MORE “we have to pass it to see what’s in it”, to me that’s abuse of power and subject to prosecution.
Why do we have all these laws that know one enforces?
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I can’t go this site to suggest this policy.
There should be a clean and concise definition of what the money is going to. For example…”$10,000 to study a monkey fing a football”…Not $10,000 to study monkey behavior.
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We need this! For the past couple years we’ve been extorted. If we the people need a million dollars for anything, we can’t get it without the government also sending another billion dollars to Ukraine. This is insanity!
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This is a must.
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@applelamps Nice work 
I’d add the following:
- All bill/laws shall pass a constitutionality review prior to being presented for a vote, including review against the constitution, constitutional ammendments, and the bill of rights.
- All bills/laws shall include a description of the constitutional authority under which they are allowed.
- All bills/laws must be read aloud in a session of the chamber prior to a vote, and the reading shall be streamed, recorded, broadcast, or otherwise made available to the public prior to the vote. (this is a way of limiting the size of the bills, so a page number limit here might also be included).
- Any bill/law that exceeds the reading time of 16 hours (2 contiguous business days) shall be removed from the floor and returned for revision and is ineligible for a vote.
- Any inclusion, reference, or contradiction to existing bills/laws shall be defined in common language, including the impact on enforcement of prior bills/legislation.
- Bills/laws may be brought for a vote by any in-good-standing member of the chamber. (to eliminate someone in a committee blocking bills from presentation)
Please change any “shoulds” in the bill to “shall” so the language is mandatory and enforcable, not a recommendation.
Anyway, really good start here!
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This should always be done.
Also I love the no “BS” name for Bill lol. The “Save America act” or “Freedom Act” are most often neither.
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@AusChuck sometimes you have to choose the problem you want to struggle with. Right now we have the problem of bills too-huge to understand, horsetrading and back room deals for add-ons, and holding bills hostage until someone’s pork-of-choice is added in.
I’d much rather they have them struggle with how to trim down and bound a bill to a single topic, clarify the purpose and impact, create accountability, and pre-test the constitutionality.
There will always be something to struggle with. Lets require they struggle with the right thing.
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I don’t know if this should be a comment or a separate proposal but here it goes. With our laws ever expanding and no clear cut way to purge them routinely I propose the following.
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In order for ANY bill to pass it must be approved with a 66% majority.
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No bill shall have permanent effect, all bills will be required to be reviewed no later than 10 years after they have taken effect or most recently been reviewed but no sooner than 2 years after to ensure the process cannot be easily weaponized ( exception, the high court is presented a case challenging law against the constitution)
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All bills may be repealed with a mere 1/3 approval.
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if something is worth being more “permanently” adopted it should be done via constitutional amendment.
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the executive powers get stripped downed to narrowly defined abilities in times of declared war or, if we have no national debt and with congressional approval, in support of our allies during a time of war.
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Without a doubt, this needs to happen. How many times have they hidden unrelated items in bills thousands of pages long just to get it through. It’s sketchy and needs to end.
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This has been a long time coming. For they have abused the multi issues under one vote.
This is quite the opposite of transparency!
Along with single issue - single bill, should be a reconstruction of the way lobbyists conduct pleas/arguments.
Honestly, I’d like to do away with them… But we know that won’t happen.
This also needs to be more transparent and I think any business they want to conduct on behalf of their wants, they would have to do it on paper.
And of course this would be made public.
The corruption that lies behind lobbyists is sickening.
Another part which needs a cleansing!
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The only way to make this happen is with a constitutional amendment. Congress will never propose this amendment, but the good news is that the states CAN and ARE in the process of making this happen. Vote for it here: Call a Convention of the States to Limit the Scope, Power and Jurisdiction of the Federal Government
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I posted this as a separate policy, but I think it might be included in here as a component of this policy.
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Lets modernize the process as well →
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This is a HUGE one. No more bills that have mostly good, but underlying crap like sending billions to other countries when we have people homeless and starving in our own country.
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South Dakota already has this. Great Idea.
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If I was president, I would automatically veto any bill that contained more than one issue.
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This sounds a lot like what Karl Denninger (Ticker Guy) has been supporting for years. Love it. Got my vote.
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I would add that any bill that impacts the federal budget in any way can and should be voided after a specified period based on the measured success/effectiveness.
If the proposed or expected outcome of a bill is not achieved in a defined period, then it is wasteful. Get rid of it.
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