I’d ask them to introduce this:
To require before final passage of any Bill the printing and full verbatim reading of the text of such Bill, and each and every amendment attached thereto, to each house of Congress called to order with a quorum physically assembled throughout, the entry of such a printing and reading in the journal of each house of Congress, and the verbatim publication of every such Bill, and each and every amendment thereto, on the official Internet web site of the Senate and the House of Representatives at least seven days before floor consideration and final passage of any Bill, and each and every amendment thereto by each house of Congress; and to provide for enforcement of the printing, reading, entry, publication, recording and affidavit requirements herein.
You want to slow down the creep of government, make it so that they have to stop writing and start reading.
As The Heartless Libertarian wrote a while back: “The Legislature is in session, and thus liberty is once again in greater danger.”
I see the “severability clause” at the bottom, sort of like the “savings clause” in a written contract.
Fine, but there needs to be another clause, the “accountability clause”
It would read like this:
“If implementation of this Bill into an Act causes any individual, corporation or legally-established political subdivision of government to have to provide funds for it’s implementation, enforcement or publication, other than as the Bill so stated in a separate clause, set off by bolder font, entitled “Cost of Implementation”, and listed as to location within the Bill in the Preamble, then such Bill is deemed to be in default of the Accountability Clause, and being in such default, is unenforceable until properly re-written and re-authorized by Congress and the President.”
Now, if we had national Initiative and Referendum, I’ll bet that I could get this passed in a trice.
The reason being, of course, is that in every Session, the Congress sticks individuals, corporations and other levels of government with the costs of it’s fine-tuning of the Constitution, and that’s wrong.
No Act of Congress should ever be passed that fails to provide a mechanism, up front, for paying for it.
You know, just the physical reading of the DoD budget alone would take the whole year.
Or were you referring to the state legislature?
Nope, I was talkig about the US Legislature: The Seante and Congress.