Conceptual Language

When was the last time you asked your lawyer to write a contract, following basic guidelines, and then signed it without going over the details?  I'm willing to bet....never.  But, that is what Congress does every single time they vote on a bill.

Bills going through Congress are so complicated now that I suppse it is naive of me to expect members of Congress to have read what they vote on.  They all have a staff, but I guess it is asking too much to expect their staff's have read the bill and explained the nuances of the legislation when it shows up in legislative language.  In fact, lobbyists actually write the bills, using "conceptual language" approved by congressional committees.  If any of you actually tried to read HR 3200 (the House bill most often referred to by the media) you know just how arcane the language and how long it took for the actual provisions of the bill to be explained.  And, are we trusting lobbyists to write a bill that actually does what Congress intended?  I wonder how much midnight oil is burned to come up with language that MIGHT be interpreted by the courts in favor of the industry suppling the brain power to actually write the legislation.

I have served on the national board of a very large non profit.  I have an inkling how this works.  In order to avoid large expenditures of cash on extra meetings, we would sometimes have the organization's staff or our attorney write a motion based on "conceptual language".  But, the final motion was always available to be read BEFORE a vote was taken.  And, when the motion was not in keeping with the board's intent, it was sent back for a rewrite.  Have you ever seen Congress send a motion back to be rewritten? 

Kudos to John Conyers who told us there was no reason to read the bill unless he had two lawyers and two days to have the bill explained to him.  Personally, I would take the two days with two lawyers, but obviously Congress does not think this is a necessity.