Reconciliation rules - time to dish

by: skeptic06

Tue Mar 09, 2010 at 14:09

You can understand that our friends on the Hill may simply view this as a necessary condition of warfare: drawing bright lines can only help the Enemy, etc.

They might, in turn, understand (but probably don't give a damn) that outsiders doubt (based, in my case, on 5+ years of observation) that the insiders (on our side, at least) have a proper grasp of the rules.

This is of particular concern on health care, where we have a perfect storm brewing: a vital bill for the Dems, intertia in Congress, a tricky (not to say, tricksy) weapon to be wielded to unblock the bill's passage, dire consequences of failure.

This is a situation which the current leadership have sedulously avoided in those 5+ years; they have taken the view (with great justice!) that their troops aren't up to pulling off that kind of coordinated series of precision shenanigans.

Now, they're committed.

Let's take a couple of points on the rules governing reconciliation:

First, is the motion to proceed to the motion to appoint conferees debatable (and hence subject to filibuster)?

The Congressional Budget Act doesn't deal with the point, that I can see; The Hill says

The parliamentarian has ruled that the limit on debate does not allow senators to filibuster the motion to proceed to a reconciliation bill.

I haven't nailed it down; but Riddick's says that it's a general rule that the motion to proceed conference reports is nondebatable, and passes on a simple majority (p472)!

Second: during Senate floor proceedings on a reconciliation bill, can amendments be ruled out of order as being dilatory?

Apparently, the GOP Alamo is to mass-produce amendments to prolong the vote-a-rama till the Last Trump. There is provision in the rules to rule non-germane amendments out of order, but no similar provision for dilatory amendments.

Of course, the cloture rule covers dilatory amendments - but (for reasons that escape me) not the rules relating to reconciliation.

Now, as we know, Generalissimo Joe can rule which ever way he chooses on points of order, and, if, on appeal, a simple majority of the Senate backs him up, that settles the issue. If Biden pulls a dilatory amendment rule from his ass, that's fine.

The appeal is (so far as I can see) debatable; but the time taken comes out of the 20 hours. However, given the volume of GOP amendments to be expected, what happens when the 20 hours has run out? Can Biden just rule all the remaining GOP amendments out of order as dilatory (or non-germane), with no possibility of appeal, because the 20 hours has expired? Or is he even allowed to rule on amendments - again, because time has run out?