Introducing Absurd Bills Into Congress by K. C. R.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · May 26, 1910

Introducing Absurd Bills Into Congress

By K. C. R.

THE Youth's Companion of May 5 contains the following article, which illustrates the extreme length to which Congressmen will go in introducing bills of various kinds into Congress:—

“Every reader of the newspapers must have seen despatches from Washington reporting that Mr. So-and-so ‘has introduced a bill’ in Congress providing some amazing change in the law. For example, it would not be surprising to learn that some member has proposed a law that every railroad company doing interstate business shall provide a shower-bath in every car.

“No one should be in the least disturbed by the intelligence that a bill has been introduced in Congress, no matter how reasonable or how absurd its provisions may be. In the House of Representatives the members merely drop their bills in a box; the bills are referred to some committee; and that is usually the end of them.

“The present Congress has already nearly thirty-three thousand bills on the calendars of the two houses. Leaving out of the account some hundreds of pension bills, almost none of the rest can be passed unless there is unanimous consent to consider them. Of course there are many members who are always ready to object to the consideration of any ‘fool’ bill.

“Inasmuch as a senator or member can introduce any number of bills on any and every subject, and since some Congressmen are willing to present ‘by request’ bills sent to them by any ‘cranky’ constituent, the fact that a bill has been introduced does not suggest that it will be passed, any more than the gathering of a summer cloud implies that the earth is to be destroyed by another deluge.”

The writer of the foregoing articles might properly have included Sunday bills among the absurd measures which are introduced into Congress.

It should be remembered, however, that Sunday bills which are before Congress, although absurd, are, nevertheless, dangerous, because there is a liability of their becoming law. This is because their absurdity is not discerned by the

lawmakers, or because legislators may fear their misguided constituency, who are urging such measures because they think they are in the interests of good government. K. C. R.