On Sunday, December 16, members of Congress were handed a 3,417-page spending bill, H.R. 2764 - or was it a 1,443-page bill? It depends on what you include. The shorter version is found at the legislative information website thomas.loc.gov, but then there are attached committee reports, in which we find most "earmarks," or specific designations for the money Congress authorized in the bill.

And it appears these committee reports have the force of law. According to analyst Brian M. Riedl, "The appropriations bills' texts contain several sections stating that a certain amount of a program's budget 'shall be available for projects and in the amounts specified in the explanatory statement described in section....; This may effectively make many of the earmarks in the conference reports legally binding." Source: Heritage Foundation

That means the larger figure is more accurate. In any case, Congress has the responsibility to comb through both the bill and the earmarks to prevent waste.

Which Congress did not do. The House passed the bill within 24 hours (and passed an amended version two days later.) The Senate passed it Tuesday evening. Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina objected to the rush, leading Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois to reply that the bill had been posted on the Internet for two whole days!

“For 46 hours and 8 minutes -- the Senator from South Carolina has had an opportunity to go to the Internet and see this bill in its entirety, with his staff, and to read every page… Please, do not come to the floor and suggest that this is a mystery bill which no one has seen. For two days, this has been posted on the Internet. You have had your chance. Every Senator has had a chance." - Sen. Dick Durbin

We're not sure this is even accurate, because we haven't found the 3,417-page version on the Internet. In any case, DeMint did the math: this would mean reading 1 1/4 pages of the bill every minute of those 46 hours before the debate. Members of the House would have had to read 2 1/2 pages every minute before their vote, with no breaks for sleeping, eating, bathroom, etc.  Source: DeMint's blog

Furthermore, by the time the Senate got to H.R. 2764, they had already passed 11 other bills that week. They even found time for such urgent matters as congratulating Appalachian State's football team and Wake Forest's soccer team. Indeed, by the time Congress adjourned Wednesday, the Senate passed 29 bills and 2,930 pages of legislation (not including additional reports and earmarks). And the House passed 33 bills amounting to 3,113 pages. (You can see the list of bills at the end of the blog version of this Dispatch.)

Apparently, Durbin assumes all members of Congress are expert speed-readers.

We at Downsize DC doubt this is so. That's why our Read the Bills Act would require all bills to be read before a quorum in Congress, and be posted on the Internet for seven full days before final passage. Some say this is not practical, but what is so practical about elected representatives not knowing the content of the bills they pass? How well has that worked for us?

Actually, the Read the Bills Act is very practical, because it will bring sunshine on bad policy and wasteful spending. And it will force Congress to write shorter bills, pass fewer bills, and spend less of our money.

Tell your Represenative and Senators that you don't believe they read H.R. 2764, because they simply didn't have the time. Tell them they have a duty to their constituents to oppose any bill they haven't read. And urge them to introduce the Read the Bills Act. You can do so here.

This week, we welcome two new members of the Read the Bills Act coalition. The Coalition is an opportunity for you to spread the word about the Read the Bills Act on your website or blog, and we will in turn announce your site here and link to it at our own blog. You can learn more and join here.

The new members are:

Studio-Owens

Sporty Blog

Thank you for being a DC Downsizer.

James Wilson

Assistant to the President

DownsizeDC.org, Inc.

PS: Jim Babka will be on the Jerry Hughes show today. Please tune in,call in, and/or send an email question or comment. This show is a great opportunity to spread the DC Downsizer message. Please support this show. Help us create "buzz!" You can do so by listening, but especially by calling-in or sending an email.

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