[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 37 (Monday, March 15, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H1399-H1400]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       HEALTH CARE RECONCILIATION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Florida (Mr. Stearns) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. STEARNS. Madam Speaker, in 1974, Congress passed the 
Congressional Budget Act. This law created an optional procedure we 
know as the budget reconciliation process. The chief purpose of the 
reconciliation process was to enhance Congress' ability to change 
current law in order to bring

[[Page H1400]]

revenue and spending levels into alignment with the budget resolution. 
That is a definition of a reconciliation bill, to control government 
spending; not to enact new policies.
  The last reconciliation bill passed by Congress was in the year 2007. 
This process was first used in 1980, and in 1985, Senator Robert Byrd 
had the Senate adopt a temporary rule to curb the practice of using 
reconciliation as a vehicle to move extraneous materials outside of the 
budget process. This rule is known today as the Byrd Rule. The Byrd 
Rule has been extended and modified over the years and in 1990 was made 
permanent when Congress amended the Congressional Budget Act of 1974.
  Now, under the Byrd Rule, a senator who is opposed to the inclusion 
of extraneous material in the reconciliation bill may offer an 
amendment or a point of order to strike that provision. The Byrd Rule 
defines six provisions of what constitutes extraneous matter. The three 
most important provisions are, one, the bill language must produce a 
change in outlays or revenues; two, the bill cannot increase the 
deficit for fiscal years beyond the budget window; three, the provision 
is a nonbudgetary component that has a fiscal effect outside of the 
Treasury.
  So today, Madam Speaker, the House Budget Committee will be meeting 
to markup a Budget Reconciliation Bill. Despite the House not having 
done a budget for the fiscal year 2011, the Budget Committee is going 
forward with reconciliation authority from last year's budget. The 
reconciliation process is being used to pass a Senate-passed health 
care bill in the House and to get the Senate to amend the 
reconciliation bill or law without fear of a filibuster.
  Now, the press is reporting that the Rules Committee will report a 
rule that will deem the Senate health care bill as passed with the 
adoption of the rule and we only have a chance to debate and vote on 
the budget reconciliation. This is outrageous and absurd. The majority 
will claim that they will only be voting on the rule, when in fact they 
will be voting on accepting the Senate bill. Last year, the House was 
passing bills without reading them. This year, they're passing bills 
without voting on them.
  This 2,309-page document makes a mockery of the entire budget 
reconciliation process. This monstrosity will be used to force a Senate 
health care bill reform on the American people who have spoken up 
loudly and spoken up to reject its backroom deals and special interest 
giveaways. Yet the Democratic leadership will ask its members to vote 
for the rule which will self-enact the Senate bill, the entire health 
care bill, in the hope that the Senate Democrats will vote later for 
reconciliation that the Senate parliamentarians will uphold the 
provisions inside the reconciliation bill which includes a self-
enacting rule vis-a-vis health care bill.
  Now, this is my understanding. There is no precedent for what the 
Democrats are doing with this deception. There has never been a 
reconciliation process as corrupt as what is happening this week. We 
have never written a reconciliation bill to amend a law that does not 
exist. We have never had a reconciliation bill with so far a reaching 
scope. This bill would seek to alter one-sixth of our economy 
permanently.
  Thomas Jefferson, the Founding Father and author of the first Senate 
rules, states, ``The minority possess their equal rights, which equal 
law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.'' The Democrats 
are violating the minority rules by this procedure. If the Byrd Rule 
applied to the House, we would never be able to pass the budget 
reconciliation.
  This bill, these tactics being used, goes way too far. It undermines 
the process of creating laws, the right to offer amendments, and the 
right to vote on a bill. It may not be politically safe for the 
majority, but we should have a proper vote, up-and-down, on this health 
care bill and an ability to amend the Senate bill. As legislators, we 
were sent here by our constituents to vote, not to hide. The proposed 
rule and the Budget Reconciliation Bill undermine our rights enumerated 
within the Constitution.
  So I urge the Democrat majority to rethink the whole procedure for 
bringing up the Senate health care bill. Enacting a rule which includes 
health care will mean that once it passes the House it will go directly 
to the President. It will not return to the Senate. The President will 
sign it and it will become law. This is what they intend contrary to 
the transparency they promised.

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