Evidence continues to pile up that Congress, as it is currently constituted, is making itself useless as an effective tool for carrying out the clear will of theAmerican people.
Most Americans want Congress to stop the waste and corruption spawned by anonymous earmarks that allow senators and representatives to send tax dollars to themselves, family and staff members, favored special interests and campaign donors.
But not only has this Congress refused to heed the public on earmarks — as seen in how majorities of both parties gutted transparency provisions of the ethics reform bill. Now, senators are perfecting yet another way to spend billions without taxpayers knowing about it until it’s too late. A similar practice is used in the House, but the Senate’s conduct has generated more attention recently.
It’s called “hotlining,” and, as so often seems to be the case in Washington, Congress is taking a common-sense practice and abusing it beyond recognition. Hotlining is how Congress traditionally deals with noncontroversial measures that ought not take up valuable floor time. If the leaders of both parties agree and nobody objects after having a reasonable opportunity to do so, then the bill is approved under a unanimous consent procedure.
But in 2007, hotlining has become a favored way of ramming through major new spending without debate or public attention in the Senate. Roll Call reports that just between July 31 and Aug. 3, 153 hotlined measures were processed, including 75 legislative proposals, 61 nominations and 17 naming post offices.
Overall in 2007, hotlining has become so common that a mere 29 measures have been approved on Senate roll call votes, with the remainder of the 399 bills and resolutions passed so far this year being hotlined, according to Roll Call.
Used properly, hotlining is a practical legislative tool. But as usual, Congress can’t resist ruining a good thing, so there are more and more examples like one among the 153 approved just before the August recess: Sen. George Voinovich’s measure to amend the Appalachian Regional Development Act of 1965.
The Ohio GOPer’s bill added $294 million over five years to a program long wracked with waste and abuse that should have been abolished years ago, but it was never debated, and no senator had to cast a record vote on it.
But doesn’t the Constitution require that federal spending bills be approved only after a public debate? That has been the tradition since the first Congress met, but don’t expect the present crop of congressmen to heed either the Constitution or tradition. Take the measure being considered in the Senate this week giving the District of Columbia a voting representative in the House, along with an additional representative for Utah. This bill is nothing more than a crass political bargain that thumbs its nose at the Founders, the Constitution and two centuries of crystal-clear federal court decisions.
Nowhere does the Constitution grant Congress authority to define representation. To the contrary, at seven separate points within its text, the Constitution makes clear that only states are to be represented in Congress. That’s why all of the 150 proposals introduced since 1888 to give the District a vote were constitutional amendments, not mere decrees by Congress.
Only one of the 150, which became the 23rd Amendment and granted the District three presidential electoral votes, was approved because beyond the Beltway, there is virtually no support for giving the District a representative or the two senators that would undoubtedly be demanded later.
So the measure before the Senate is unconstitutional on its face, and no amount of rationalizing or political bargaining will change this fact. Yet, the measure passed the House earlier this year, though with substantial opposition, and has a chance of getting through the Senate as well.
So Congress flouts the Constitution and spends tax dollars behind closed doors without recorded votes or public debate. Americaused to have a government of laws, not men. Now, we have legions of congressmen who use the law to enrich themselves and who refuse to allow themselves to be held accountable to the people they represent.
Democracy itself will soon become a joke, or worse, if drastic reforms are not soon forced upon this Congress and all that follow.
Mark Tapscott is editorial page editor of The Washington Examiner and proprietor of Tapscott’s Copy Desk blog.
