How a Bill Becomes Law in the U.S. Congress
A Simplified Explanation of the Legislative Process
The House and Senate each have different procedures for reaching the same goal; the passage of legislation; and it can become confusing to the average citizen. For a very detailed, technical explanation of the process followed by each chamber, see the House's How Our Laws Are Made or the Senate's Enactment of a Law.
A simpler version of How Our Laws Are Made can be found at www.house.gov/house/Tying_it_all.html.
This is a simplified explanation of how a bill becomes law.
There can be many twists and turns in the time it takes for a bill to be introduced until it is signed into law that are not included here. In this document we refer to the House as an example. The same very basic process applies to the Senate as well.
The President, special interest groups, advocates--anyone--can suggest bills but only Senators and Representatives can introduce bills.
Once the bill has been introduced it is given a number (S. for the Senate, H.R. for the House) and referred to the appropriate Committee(s). The Committee may then assign it to one of its Subcommittees.
Hearings at the Subcommittee level may be held on the bill to gather testimony from interested individuals. (At times hearings and markup are held at the full Committee level.) The Subcommittee (or the Committee) marks up (reviews and makes changes to) the bill, approves it, and sends it to the full committee (or the Committee sends it to the full House).
The full committee marks up (reviews and makes changes) to the bill, approves it, and issues a report. This report sets forth the text of the approved bill, makes recommendations and suggestions regarding implementation not included in the actual text of the bill (sometimes referred to as Congressional intent), and includes any dissent expressed by members of the committee. The full committee then offers the bill for approval by the full House (floor action).
The full House then votes on the bill (floor action), and passes it.
In the meantime, the Senate may have passed the bill with changes so that the two versions do not agree. The bill cannot become law until both the House and Senate agree on the contents of the bill. The House and the Senate appoint conferees to work out the differences and to come up with a mutually agreeable bill. These conferees are typically members of the committee and/or subcommittee that worked on the original bills and sometimes the authors of major amendments. Once the conferees have agreed on the contents of the bill, the conference committee issues a report containing the text of the agreed-upon bill which must be voted on by both the House and the Senate.
The House and Senate approve the conference agreement.
The bill is sent to the President for his signature. The President signs the bill and it becomes law.
-or-
The President vetoes the bill and sends it back to the Congress.
The House and the Senate override the President's veto with a two-thirds vote in each chamber and the bill becomes law. If both chambers do not vote to override the President's veto, the bill does not become law. The bill becomes law and is assigned a Public Law Number.
A bill is considered dead when:
no action is taken on it in either the House or the Senate, or both. Only 460 bills were passed in the 110th Congress but approximately 11,100 were introduced. Legislators couldn't possibly deal with that number of pieces of legislation. Many bills are simply duplicates of each other; some are about issues that do not have a very high priority. These bills will never receive consideration. Some legislation requires attention, such as passage of programs like the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the Rehabilitation Act, or appropriations bill to fund the running of the government. Some bills are introduced by influential legislators and demand some level of attention.
only one chamber takes action on the bill and the same or similar bill was not introduced in the other chamber, they did not take action on it, or it was not approved.
either of the chambers does not approve a conference agreement.
either or both of the chambers cannot get a two-thirds majority to override a presidential veto.
Each Congress has two one-year sessions. At the end of the first session of a Congress, bills that have been introduced are carried forward into the second session for further action. At the end of the second session, if a bill has not been passed by both the House and the Senate, it is considered dead. The same bill would have to be reintroduced in the next Congress.
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