OHA Hospital Advocacy - How A Bill Becomes a Law

How a Bill Becomes a Law

Private citizens, interest groups, businesses, legislators and other elected officials often come up with ideas for how things could be improved or notice problems with how things are being done, both of which require changes in state and federal law. To enact these changes, a bill must be introduced and successfully make its way through the legislative process. That process is outlined below.

Introduction
Proposed changes to state laws, known as bills, are initiated in the Ohio Senate or the Ohio House of Representatives, the two chambers which make up the Ohio General Assembly. Proposed changes to federal laws are initiated in the U.S. House of Representatives or the U.S. Senate, the two chambers that make up the United States Congress. After deciding to sponsor a proposed change, Senators and Representatives submit their ideas to the appropriate body, which prepares a first draft of a bill in proper legal form. The bill is then assigned a bill number to be used throughout the two-year, legislative session.

Reference Committee
Each chamber has a reference committee, which assigns bills to a standing committee, discussed below. The reference committee reports back to the full chamber its recommendations for committee assignments.

Committee Hearings
At the beginning of each two-year session, each chamber develops and appoints members to standing committees, comprised of small groups of lawmakers who consider bills that fall in the committee's area of jurisdiction. After hearing testimony for and against the proposal, the committee may pass, or report, the bill without changes; amend it with changes; substitute it with many changes; or fail to take action on it.

Rules Committee
Bills approved by a standing committee go to the rules committee, which each chamber staffs to determine which bills will be voted on by the entire chamber and on what date.

Floor Action
A bill receives its third consideration when the entire chamber considers its passage. After the bill's sponsor explains its purpose, the chamber may pass it, with or without amendments; defeat it or postpone action until a later date. For a bill to continue through the legislative process, it must be approved by a majority of members.

The Other Chamber
After a bill is approved by the chamber in which it originated, it then goes to the second chamber, where it follows the same general hearing process. That chamber may then pass it as is or with changes of its own. Bills passing the second chamber with no changes go on to the governor or the president for approval. However if the chamber makes changes, the bill must go back to the original chamber for its members' approval. When the two chambers cannot resolve their differences, the bill often goes to a conference committee. This committee will try to resolve the differences. If the differences are resolved, the bill goes to the floor of both the House and Senate for final approval.

Action by the Governor
The governor must consider each bill which passes both chambers of the Ohio General Assembly. If the governor approves the bill, it is signed and takes effect generally after 90 days. Emergency bills, which lawmakers can enact with a two-thirds majority, and bills which appropriate state money take effect immediately upon the governor's signature. The governor can take no action and allow the bill to become law after 10 days, or veto it, sending it back to the General Assembly with an explanation for the veto. In appropriations bills, the governor can void specific sections with a line-item veto.

Action by the President
The United States Constitution provides that every bill passing both the House of Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it becomes a law, be presented to the President of the United States.

In actual practice, a clerk of the Committee on House Administration, or the Secretary of the Senate when the bill originated in that body, delivers the original enrolled bill to a clerk at the White House and obtains a receipt.

The President then has a 10-day constitutional period for action on the bill. The President may take three actions on the bill. He may sign it, do nothing in the 10-day period, or veto it and return it to Congress with his objections.

If the President approves the bill, he signs it and usually writes the word "approved" and the date. The bill may become law without the President's signature by virtue of the constitutional provision that if the President does not return a bill with objections within 10 days (excluding Sundays) after it has been presented to the President, it become law as if the President had signed it.

However, if Congress by their adjournment prevent its return, it does not become law. The latter event is known as a "pocket veto"; that is, the bill does not become law even though the President has not sent his objections to Congress.

If the President vetoes a bill, two-thirds majority of both chambers must vote to override the veto for the bill to become law. Due to a U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1998, the President does not effectively have line item veto authority to void specific sections of bills.

A bill becomes law on the date of approval or passage over the President's veto, unless it expressly provides a different effective date.