I recently got an email saying that Congress exempted itself from the Healthcare Reform bill that it passed last year. Is this true? How often has our Congress done this in the past? Are there any trends toward more or less use of this (in my opinion) egregious practice? And, finally, is there any serious talk about a constitutional amendment to stop it?
A quick Google search says it’s not true: http://mediamatters.org/research/201003250022
No, not true.
If you first read about it in an email, chances are it isn’t true.
It would be terrific to have a Constitutional amendment making the sending of idiotic falsehoods in email glurge illegal. Why does nobody ever talk about that? :dubious:
We wouldn’t need to amend the constitution for that. I’m sure Congress could just pass a law, and the SCOTUS could squeeze it by on some Commerce Clause basis.
Write to your senators and representatives!
Current law has Members of Congress as federal employees and thus eligible for Federal Employees Health Benefits (FEHB) Program coverage. FEHB is not a healthcare program, per se. FEBH is a program where federal employees may select among several private heath care companies that have been vetted for their coverage. New federal employees have a 60-day grace period when they may enroll, or choose not to enroll (in which case they may seek health coverage as an individual/family and pay the higher rates). Once a year during open season federal employees may decide to switch their coverage. It’s open season right now.
That’s a general rule about ALL news stories: If the first you’ve heard about it is in a real news source (news website, newspaper, news TV show, etc.), then it might be true. (Even then, no guarantees.) If the first you’ve heard about it is in an email. it’s almost certainly NOT true.
Coming back to the other aspects of the OP’s question (are there examples where Congress actually did exempt itself from laws it enacted?): Here is a website from the website of the House covering all sorts of acts that have been said not to apply to Congress, together with a discussion of the merits of these claims
What you linked to was from 1993, so it’s possible that at least some of those laws are now applicable to Congress. Beyond those, though, there were a number of laws that were not applicable to Congress, specifically ones that dealt with hiring discrimination and fair treatment of employees. When Republicans came to power in 1994, as part of their “Contract with America”, they passed the Congressional Accountability Act, which required Congress to follow those laws. The CAA applied the following laws to Congress:
The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967
The Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute
Veterans’ employment and reemployment rights at Chapter 43 of Title 38 of the U.S. Code
The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Employee Polygraph Protection Act of 1988
The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938
The Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993
Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970
The Rehabilitation Act of 1973
The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act of 1989
See this Factcheck article for more details:
I am recalling this from 20 plus years ago, but these, and a substantial amount more have been passed. Of course, whoever reads the laws that come out? Where are they posted?
At any rate, some substantial laws were made known in the newspapers, whenever it was, and they noted the clause “members of Congress are exempt” etc… It was shocking, not the vast number of laws like that, but that they were laws that were thought to be so well known.
Kinda like a Congressional double secret probation…
Best wishes,
hh
Every action of the federal government gets published in the Federal Register.
If you want the text of bills, go to Congressional Bills: Main Page.
All bills are browsable there in full.