    [Constitution, Jefferson's Manual, and the Rules of the House of Representatives, 104th Congress]
    [104th Congress]
    [House Document 103-342]
    [Jeffersons Manual of ParliamentaryPractice]
    [Pages 255-258]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

                          SEC. XLIII.--RECONSIDERATION.

    Sec. 513. Early Senate practice as to
    reconsideration.

      1798, Jan.  A bill on its second reading being amended, and on
    the question whether it shall be read a third time negatived, was
    restored by a decision to reconsider that question. Here the votes of
    negative and reconsideration, like positive and negative quantities in
    equation, destroy one another, and are as if they were expunged from the
    journals. Consequently the bill is open for amendment, just so far as it
    was the moment preceding the question for the third reading; that is to
    say, all parts of the bill are open for amendment except those on which
    votes have been already taken in its present stage. So, also, it may be
    recommitted.

    [[Page 256]]
    sent to the other House. But where the paper remains, as on a bill
    rejected, when or under what circumstances does it cease to be
    susceptible of reconsideration? This remains to be settled, unless a
    sense that the right of reconsideration is a right to waste the time of
    the House in repeated agitations of the same question, so that it shall
    never know when a question is done with, should induce them to reform
    this anomalous proceeding.

      The rule permitting a reconsideration of a question affixing it to no
    limitation of time or circumstance, it may be asked whether there is no
    limitation? If, after the vote, the paper on which it is passed has been
    parted with, there can be no reconsideration, as if a vote has been for
    the passage of a bill and the bill has been

      The House of Representatives provides for reconsideration by clause 1
    of rule XVIII.

    Sec. 514. Parliamentary law as to
    reconsideration.

      In Parliament  a question once carried can not be questioned again
    at the same session, but must stand as the judgment of the House.
    Towns., col. 67; Mem. in Hakew., 33. * * *

    [[Page 257]]
    House and sent to the other and there rejected, may be renewed again in
    that other, passed, and sent back. Ib., 92; 3 Hats., 161. Or if, instead
    of being rejected, they read it once and lay it aside or amend it and
    put it off a month, they may order in another to the same effect, with
    the same or a different title. Hakew., 97, 98.

    Sec. 515. A bill once rejected not to be brought
    up again at the same session.

      * * * And a  bill once rejected, another of the same
    substance can not be brought in again the same session. Hakew., 158; 6
    Grey, 392. But this does not extend to prevent putting the same question
    in different stages of a bill, because every stage of a bill submits the
    whole and every part of it to the opinion of the House as open for
    amendment, either by insertion or omission, though the same amendment
    has been accepted or rejected in a former stage. So in reports of
    committees, e.g., report of an address, the same question is before the
    House, and open for free discussion. Towns., col. 26; 2 Hats., 98, 100,
    101. So orders of the House or instructions to committees may be
    discharged. So a bill, begun in one

      In the House of Representatives, with its rule for reconsideration,
    there is rarely an attempt to bring forward a bill once rejected at the
    same session. One instance is recorded (IV, 3384), but the House has
    declined to consider a bill brought forward after a rejection (IV, 3384;
    Mar. 9, 1910, p. 2966). The Committee on Rules may report as privileged
    a resolution making in order the consideration of a measure of the same
    substance as one previously rejected and to rescind or vacate the action
    whereby the House had rejected a measure (Mar. 17, 1976, p. 6776; see
    VIII, 3391); and a special order of business nearly identical to one
    previously rejected by the House, but providing a different scheme for
    general debate, was held not to violate this section (July 27, 1993, p.
    ----).

    [[Page 258]]
    may be taken up by another bill or taken up in a different way. 6 Grey,
    304, 316.

    Sec. 516. Expedients for changing the effect
    of bills once passed.

      Divers expedients  are used to correct the effects of this rule,
    as, by passing an explanatory act, if anything has been omitted or ill
    expressed, 3 Hats., 278, or an act to enforce and make more effectual an
    act, &c., or to rectify mistakes in an act, &c., or a committee on one
    bill may be instructed to receive a clause to rectify the mistakes of
    another. Thus, June 24, 1685, a clause was inserted in a bill for
    rectifying a mistake committed by a clerk in engrossing a bill of
    supply. 2 Hats., 194, 6. Or the session may be closed for one, two,
    three, or more days and a new one commenced. But then all matters
    depending must be finished, or they fall, and are to begin de novo. 2
    Hats., 94, 98. Or a part of the subject

    Sec. 517. Exceptions to the rule against bringing up a
    matter once rejected.

      And in  cases of the last magnitude this rule has not
    been so strictly and verbally observed as to stop indispensable
    proceedings altogether. 2 Hats., 92, 98. Thus when the address on the
    preliminaries of peace in 1782 had been lost by a majority of one, on
    account of the importance of the question and smallness of the majority,
    the same question in substance, though with some words not in the first,
    and which might change the opinion of some Members, was brought on again
    and carried, as the motives for it were thought to outweigh the
    objection of form. 2 Hats, 99, 100.

    Sec. 518. Passage of supplementary bills.

      A second  bill may
    be passed to continue an act of the same session or to enlarge the time
    limited for its execution. 2 Hats., 95, 98. This is not in contradiction
    to the first act.

      The House of Representatives has by a joint resolution corrected an
    error in a bill that had gone to the President (IV, 3519).