Back to News & Commentary

Congress-ese: A Suspension of...Rules

Allie Bohm,
Policy Counsel,
NYCLU
Share This Page
September 3, 2008

The suspension calendar is used in the House of Representatives to quickly pass (usually) non-controversial bills (for example, bills , , or ). Suspension, in this case, refers to suspending normal congressional procedure rules (not suspending children from school). In this streamlined process, a bill that comes up may be debated by Congress for up to 40 minutes, but may not be amended (changed) and requires two-thirds of the representatives to vote in favor of it for passage. A bill on the suspension calendar will usually pass by 鈥渧oice vote鈥 鈥 in which all in favor say 鈥渁ye鈥 and all opposed say 鈥渘o鈥. When a bill passes (or fails) by voice vote, there is no recorded roll call, so constituents have no way of finding out how their Representative voted.

So we'll never know how all the House members feel about watermelons, evidently.

Learn More 老澳门开奖结果 the Issues on This Page