Not linked on Ron Paul’s Congressional Website.
HON. RON PAUL
OF TEXAS
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Thursday, March 5, 2009
2009 Ron Paul 23:1
Mr. PAUL. Madam Speaker, Supreme Court
Justice Louis Brandeis famously said, “Sunlight
is the best disinfectant.” In order to shine
sunlight on the practices of the House of Representatives,
and thus restore public trust and
integrity to this institution, I am introducing the
sunlight rule, which amends House rules to
ensure that members have adequate time to
study a bill before being asked to vote on it.
One of the chief causes of increasing public
cynicism regarding Congress is the way major
pieces of legislation are brought to the floor
without members having an opportunity to
read the bills. For example, the over-one-thousand
page economic stimulus bill was first
posted on the Internet at 12:30 a.m. the night
before the vote. Obviously, this did not give individual
members of Congress adequate time
to review what is certainly one of, if not the,
most significant pieces of legislation that Congress
will consider this year.
2009 Ron Paul 23:2
My proposed rule requires that no piece of
legislation, including conference reports, can
be brought before the House of Representatives
unless it has been available to members
and staff in both print and electronic version
for at least ten days. My bill also requires that
a manager’s amendment that makes substantive
changes to a bill be available in both
printed and electronic forms at least 72 hours
before voted on. While manager’s amendments
are usually reserved for technical
changes, oftentimes manager’s amendments
contain substantive additions to or subtractions
from bills. Members should be made
aware of such changes before being asked to
vote on a bill.
2009 Ron Paul 23:3
The sunlight rule provides the people the
opportunity to be involved in enforcing the rule
by allowing a citizen to petition for an Office of
Congressional Ethics investigation into any
House Member who votes for a bill brought to
the floor in violation of this act. The sunlight
rule can never be waived by the Committee
on Rules or House leadership. If an attempt is
made to bring a bill to the floor in violation of
this rule, any member could raise a point of
order requiring the bill to be immediately
pulled from the House calendar until it can be
brought to the floor in a manner consistent
with this rule.
2009 Ron Paul 23:4
Madam Speaker, the practice of rushing
bills to the floor before individual members
have had a chance to study the bills is one of
the major factors contributing to public distrust
of Congress. Voting on bills before members
have had time to study them makes a mockery
of representative government and cheats
the voters who sent us here to make informed
decisions on public policy. Adopting the sunlight
rule is one of, if not the, most important
changes to the House rules this Congress
could make to restore public trust in, and help
preserve the integrity of, this institution. I hope
my colleagues will support this change to the
House rules.
