Who Writes Bills?

Civics 101

NHPR

History, Government, Society & Culture

4.2 • 2.6K Ratings

🗓️ 21 March 2023

⏱️ 24 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

If you've learned about things like Separation of Powers and Checks and Balances, you know the tried and true notion that Congress makes the laws, the executive branch enforces them, and the judicial branch interprets them. But would it surprise you to hear that's not how it goes most of the time? Today we explore who really writes the majority of legislation in the US, and how it got to be that way. We talk with Dan Cassino of Fairleigh Dickinson University, who breaks down that first step of the legislative process. Here are links to our related episodes; How a Bill (Really) Becomes a Law and Citizens United. Click here to sign up for our newsletter, Extra Credit! CLICK HERE: Visit our website to see all of our episodes, donate to the podcast, sign up for our newsletter, get free educational materials, and more! To see Civics 101 in book form, check out A User's Guide to Democracy: How America Works by Hannah McCarthy and Nick Capodice, featuring illustrations by Tom Toro. Check out our other weekly NHPR podcast, Outside/In - we think you'll love it! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm skilled just to build.
0:02.0	K-Bill, you certainly have a lot of patience and courage.
0:06.0	Well, I got this far. When I started, I wasn't even a bill. I was just an idea.
0:12.0	We already did this.
0:14.0	We did how a bill really becomes a law.
0:16.0	And I'm even putting a link to it in the show notes so that we can put the cabash on the whole schoolhouse rock thing.
0:22.0	That's fair. That little hopeful 1970s animated scrap of paper has gotten a lot of airtime here on Civics 101.
0:29.0	Fine. But Hannah, I want to focus on that first step of the legislative process and just that first step.
0:36.0	And to do it, I would like you to imagine a senator.
0:41.0	Lion in bed, unable to sleep, tossing and turning all night.
0:46.0	What could be interrupting their slumber?
0:49.0	Well, over the weekend, the senator was in their home state and they went for a walk along the beach and they saw to their abject horror.
0:57.0	A flotilla of trash, bottles and cans and plastic bags carpeting the shore and the vision of it haunts their sleep.
1:06.0	How awful. Something must be done.
1:08.0	Something must be done, exactly. And just before dawn, inspiration strikes.
1:14.0	The weary senator flies back to DC, takes out a pen, writes some words down and silently hands it to the senate clerk.
1:23.0	Sounds like a Frank Capra film.
1:25.0	And this bill goes through committee. It's voted on, Claude Rain shows up and eventually it makes its way to the desk of the president to be signed into law.
1:34.0	Our senator watching on with a tear in the eye.
1:39.0	It's a story that I would really love to watch in a cold night, you know.
1:43.0	But it's not really how laws are written, is it?
1:45.0	No, not even remotely.
	...

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