Constitutional Law

Posr-Heller Federal legislation

H.R. 1399, the "D of C Personal Protection Act." is moving. They're talking about a discharge petition. You can move a bill that is stalled in committee by one of those, which discharges the committee from responsibility and moves the bill to the floor. Difficulties are (1) the petition must have 218 signatures, a majority of the House; (2) the leadership gets to know who has signed it; (3) nobody else does, so you can have 225 people swearing they signed, and be left wondering why it hasn't met its goal. You get to know the current count, but not the identities.

UPDATE: a reader emails me that under reforms put into place in the 103rd Congress, the identities of those signing a discharge petition are now public information. I greatly like that reform. Last discharge petition I was involved with was in 1986.

Full post as published by Of Arms and the Law on July 14, 2008 (boomark / email).