Passing an American Bill into law

Factual Questions
21

To address your last question first–at least from the text of the constitution, it looks like there is no distinction between a veto made when congress is or is not in session-- so I would think that, as long as what the prez does is veto a bill, that veto can be overridden.

A pocket veto is the only way the president can avoid a veto override (At least temporarily–congress can always re-pass the bill, and get it to him at a time when he can’t pocket veto it).

The answer to all your other questions seems to me to be politics–in your first case, refusing to sign a bill is a gesture, and appearances matter-- the president may want a bill to pass, but also be able to legitimately argue he’s against it, or at least does not support it–and hence may choose to not sign a bill (knowing it will become law), for the effect as a gesture. (just like a senator voting for cloture, knowing that the majority supports the bill–so it will pass–but then voting against the bill itself (so he can claim he opposed it). Similarly, a veto override probably makes the president look weak–so he may not want to veto a bill he opposes if it will clearly be overridden–if it is inevitable that the bill becomes law.

Similarly, in your second case, a veto is a dramatic act----whereas a pocket veto is a little-known procedural trick. So, if congress isn’t in session, he may prefer to use the pocket veto on a bill he doesn’t like, so that its failure to become law is less dramatic or noticeable. On the other hand, if popular opinion is against a bill, the President may want to veto rather than pocket veto–to get his opposition to the bill clearly on the record.

22

Basically, a bill becomes law if both the Senate and the House pass the same bill by majority vote and the President signs it.

The President can veto a bill, but the House and Senate can override the President’s veto by repassing the bill with a 2/3 majority of both houses. In that case, the bill still becomes law. This happens about every two to four years.

Also a bill becomes law automatically after 10 days if the President doesn’t sign the bill, but doesn’t veto the bill either. This happens quite a bit.

There is one more Constitutional provision known as a pocket veto. If the President doesn’t sign a bill into law, and the House or Senate have adjourned for the session, the bill is not passed. This is extremely rare on the federal level, but is quite common on the state level since most states have similar governmental structure as the federal government. In many states, the legislature can only meet a certain number of days. If the legislature passes a bill at the last minute, and is forced to adjourn, the governor can pocket veto the bill.

Either the Senate or the House can originate a bill (except the Senate constitutionally cannot originate budget bills, but they can get around this by taking a house bill and amending it into a budget bill). Most bills have separate House and Senate numbering,

It is very possible that the Senate and House pass two different versions of the bill. In this case, the bill goes to a conference committee that works out the differences, and the unified bill goes back to a final vote before the Senate and House.

The 60% Senate majority you speak of has to do with the individual rules in each house. In the House, debate on a bill can be ended on a majority vote, and each member can be limited on the amount of time they spend debating the bill. In the Senate, you can only end debate with a 60% vote, and individual senators can speak for as long as they like.

This means that in many cases, a minority party can hold up legislation by filibustering. The big power of filibustering is that you can only present a single bill at a time, so filibustering stops all action in the Senate. This means that the majority party may be reluctant to take up a bill unless they know they can get the 3/5 votes they need to shut down debate.

By the way, this doesn’t mean they have 60% support for a bill. For example, a particular senator is against a bill, and if the bill goes up for a vote, the bill will pass. This senator might be persuaded to vote to end debate if they are given something politically – say a promise of an amendment to this bill or another bill.

A senator might vote to end debate – even though it means a bill they’re against will pass because there is another bill that they want to pass. Remember that only a single bill at a time can be debated, so this one bill is preventing all other bills from coming to the floor of the Senate.

23

Note that most of the details of the process (filibustering, committees, etc.) are a result of the rules each House sets down, not the Constitution directly. The Constitution lays down a couple of ground rules, but says that other than that, each House can choose its own procedures. So, for instance, the Senate as a whole could choose to do away with the procedural filibuster, or the House could choose to institute it, or either one could do away with the committees and just have everything discussed by the entire house. For a variety of practical and political reasons, they don’t make changes like this, but they could.

24

whorfin, thanks for your excellent summary. That makes perfect sense.