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RECONCILIATION
Reconciliation (United States Congress)From Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaJump to: navigation, searchReconciliation is a legislative process in the United States Senate intended to allow consideration of a contentious budget bill without the threat of filibuster. Introduced in 1974, reconciliation limits debate and amendment, and therefore favors the majority party. Reconciliation also exists in the United States House of Representatives, but because the House regularly passes rules that constrain debate and amendment, the process has had a less significant impact on that body. A reconciliation instruction (Budget Reconciliation) is a provision in a budget resolution directing one or more committees to submit legislation changing existing law in order to bring spending, revenues, or the debt-limit into conformity with the budget resolution. The instructions specify the committees to which they apply, indicate the appropriate dollar changes to be achieved, and usually provide a deadline by which the legislation is to be reported or submitted.[1] A reconciliation bill is one containing changes in law recommended pursuant to reconciliation instructions in a budget resolution. If the instructions pertain to only one committee in a chamber, that committee reports the reconciliation bill. If the instructions pertain to more than one committee, the House Budget Committee reports an omnibus reconciliation bill, but it may not make substantive changes in the recommendations of the other committees.[2]
[edit] HistoryReconciliation is one of the most important developments to emerge from the Congressional Budget Act of 1974. (See Pub.L. 93-344, § 310; 88 Stat. 297; 2 U.S.C. § 641.) Reconciliation developed into an important procedure for implementing the policy decisions and assumptions embraced in a budget resolution, in a way that was unforeseen when the Budget Act was written. Under the original design of the Budget Act, reconciliation had a fairly narrow purpose. It was expected to be used together with the second resolution adopted in the fall, and was to apply to a single fiscal year and be directed primarily at spending and revenue legislation acted on between the adoption of the first and second budget resolutions. But Congress has used the procedure to enact far-reaching omnibus budget bills, first in 1981. Since 1980, 17 of 23 reconciliation bills have been signed into law by Republican presidents (a Republican has been president for 20 of the last 29 years). Since 1980, reconciliation has been utilized nine times when Republicans controlled both the House and the Senate, six times when Democrats controlled both the House and the Senate,one time when the Democrats controlled the Senate and the Republicans the House, and seven times when the Republicans controlled the Senate and the Democrats controlled the House. Reconciliation has been used at least once nominally for a non-budgetary purpose, namely the College Cost Reduction and Access Act of 2007 (a Republican was president and the Democrats controlled both the House and the Senate). The 1986 Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 (COBRA) contained some healthcare type reforms. The Byrd Rule (described below) was adopted in 1985 and amended in 1990. Its main effect is that reconciliation cannot be used for provisions that would increase the deficit beyond 10 years after the reconciliation measure. Congress used reconciliation to enact President Bill Clinton's 1993 (fiscal year 1994) budget. (See Pub.L. 103-66, 107 Stat. 312.) Clinton wanted to use reconciliation to pass his 1993 health care plan, but Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV) insisted that the health care plan was out of bounds for a process that is theoretically about budgets. Although reconciliation was originally understood to be for the purpose of improving the government's fiscal position (reducing deficits or increasing surpluses), the language of the 1974 act referred only to "changes" in revenue and spending amounts; not specifically to increases or decreases. In 1999, the Senate for the first time used reconciliation to pass legislation that would substantially worsen the government's fiscal position: the Taxpayer Refund and Relief Act 1999. This act was passed when the Government was expected to run large surpluses: it was subsequently vetoed by President Clinton. A similar situation happened in 2000, when the Senate again used reconciliation to pass the Marriage Tax Relief Reconciliation Act 2000, which was also vetoed by Clinton. At the time the use of the reconciliation procedure to pass such bills was controversial.[3] During the administration of President George W. Bush, Congress used reconciliation to enact three major tax cuts, each of which substantially increased the deficit. These tax cuts were set to lapse after 10 years to satisfy the Byrd Rule. Efforts to use reconciliation to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling failed. [edit] 2010 health care reform controversy
In 2009 the House and Senate each passed separate health care reform bills. The Senate bill passed only after all 60 members of the Democratic caucus voted for cloture to stop an attempted Republican filibuster. Negotiations to produce a compromise bill acceptable to majorities in both houses were thrown off track by Republican Scott Brown's victory in the 2010 Massachusetts Senate special election. After Brown's victory, the Democratic caucus no longer had enough votes to stop a Senate filibuster of the compromise bill. An alternative plan was for the House to pass the Senate bill verbatim, and for each house to pass another bill that would embody the compromises agreed to in the negotiations. This separate piece of legislation, which might possibly include a public option, would require use of the reconciliation procedure in the Senate.[4][5] The New Republic wrote: "When it comes to enacting laws and then later amending those laws, it doesn't matter in what order Congress passes bills. All that matters is the order in which the president signs those bills into law. As long as the president signs the health care bill 30 seconds before he signs the reconciliation bill, the latter can amend or repeal any provisions in the former. So the House and Senate could, in theory, vote on a conference report amending the Senate health care bill before the House actually has to take the tougher vote to accept the Senate bill. No matter whether the House votes on reconciliation or the Senate bill first, the Speaker can ensure that the health care bill is signed into law before reconciliation."[6] The Republican leader in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, said: “Using reconciliation would be an acknowledgment that there is bipartisan opposition to their bill, another in a series of backroom deals, and the clearest signal yet that they’ve decided to completely ignore the American people.” according to the NY Times February 19, 2010 [1]. Other opponents of Democratic legislative initiatives in the 111th Congress began to refer to reconciliation as the "nuclear option", although that term had previously been used to refer only to a majoritarian procedure to effect a formal change in Senate rules.[7] [edit] ProcessTo trigger the reconciliation process, Congress passes a concurrent resolution on the budget instructing one or more committees to report changes in law affecting the budget by a certain date. If the budget instructs more than one committee, then those committees send their recommendations to the Budget Committee of their House, and the Budget Committee packages the recommendations into a single omnibus bill. In the Senate, the reconciliation bill then gets only 20 hours of debate, and amendments are limited. [edit] Byrd RuleFurther information: Sunset provision: The Budget Act and the Byrd RuleReconciliation generally involves legislation that changes the budget deficit (or conceivably, the surplus). The "Byrd Rule" (2 U.S.C. § 644, named after Democratic Senator Robert Byrd) was adopted in 1985 and amended in 1990 to outline which provisions reconciliation can and cannot be used for. The Byrd Rule defines a provision to be "extraneous" (and therefore ineligible for reconciliation) in six cases:
Any senator may raise a procedural objection to a provision believed to be extraneous, which will then be ruled on by the Presiding Officer, customarily on the advice of the Senate Parliamentarian. A vote of 60 senators is required to overturn the ruling. The Presiding Officer need not necessarily follow the advice of the Parliamentarian, and the Parliamentarian can be replaced by the Senate Majority Leader.[8] [edit] Examples (social legislation deleted)Reconciliation bills have included:
[edit] See also[edit] References
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