Copper Dome Chronicle Special Edition: Senate Budget Week 2023
Welcome to this week’s edition of the Copper Dome Chronicle, sponsored by Advocatus. We strive for substantive writing with brevity, inspired by the book Smart Brevity; one of the best books about communications and writing we’ve read in years.
This week is a special edition: Senate Budget Week. It's 1,061 words or a 4 minute read. Thanks for reading; we welcome your feedback and commentary!
1. Learn The Rules (Again)
“The young man knows the rules, but the old man knows the exceptions.” - quote attributed to Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.; American physician, poet, and polymath.
The rules of legislative chambers are critical to success as an advocate. One can use them to clear a path to passage or build a blockade to stop a bill in its tracks. Our House Budget Week post pointed out several House Rules to remember.
One key difference between the House and Senate Rules concerns amendments to the budget that shift dollars between budget lines. The House has a fairly restrictive rule, House Rule 5.3.B.3, which requires amendments increasing or decreasing spending by more than $1M must have an offset. So if a House member proposed an amendment to increase education funding by $5M, the member must propose an decrease of $5M from somewhere else in the budget.
The Senate Rules have no such requirement, though generally speaking amendments proposed without offsets are highly scrutinized. But the Senate has considered and adopted the “balancing amendment,” which does exactly what it says: it balances the budget because it is constitutionally required in Article X, Section 7(a).
This week the phrase “masthead” will be used in accordance with Senate Rule 10. The rule states in part “Notwithstanding the provisions of Rule 33 and unless otherwise ordered by the Senate, when the annual General Appropriation Bill or a Capital Reserve Fund Resolution or any reapportionment bill or any Resolution affecting the sine die adjournment date is received by the Senate to be placed on the calendar, it shall be placed in a position under the masthead of the calendar as the first order of business to be taken up each day immediately following the conclusion of the call of the Uncontested Local Calendar.” The order of business is established by Senate Rule 32A and here are the first ten items:
1. Called to Order by the President
2. Prayer by the Chaplain
3. Pledge of Allegiance
4. Receipt of Communications
5. Introduction and reference of new Bills and Resolutions
6. Call of the Uncontested local Third Reading Calendar
7. Call of the Uncontested local Second Reading Calendar
Masthead Status: General Appropriations Act
8. Call of the Uncontested Statewide Third Reading Calendar
9. Call of the Uncontested Statewide Second Reading Calendar
10. Motion Period
Past practice in the Senate has been to work on the budget bill until it has received its required readings, then if there are statewide session days remaining to work the rest of the calendar.
While the House votes on sections of budget during the debate, the Senate must comply with Senate Rule 16, which states in part “Prior to third reading of the annual general appropriations bill, each section of Part IA with the corresponding provisos must be considered individually and receive a roll call vote.” The Senate practice has been to call the roll of the Senate with each Senator announcing their votes on each section and final passage at the conclusion of the budget debate. Depending on the speed of the roll call, this can take up to 45 minutes and is dubbed “vote-a-rama.”
2. Rule 24
No Senate Budget Week post would be complete without discussion of what is perhaps the most famous rule under the copper dome: Rule 24. Senate Rule 24(a) states in part:
“Matter which is germane to the subject of the General Appropriation Bill and any Supplemental Appropriation Bill shall be defined as those things which reasonably, specifically, and inherently directly relate to the raising or spending of revenue for or in the fiscal year for which the bill applies and do not temporarily or permanently add, amend, or repeal a portion of the general permanent laws of South Carolina. Nothing in this paragraph prohibits the temporary suspension of any permanent law.”
Put simply, this rule allows the Senate to remove budget provisos adopted by the House, as well as prevents Senators from adding or amending provisos, which do not add, amend, or repeal any law temporarily or permanently. The ability to create, amend, or repeal policy in Part 1B of the budget is restricted.
By comparison, House Rule 5.3.B.4 states: “No amendments thereto may temporarily or permanently add, amend, repeal, or alter a portion of the general permanent tax laws of South Carolina. Nothing in this paragraph prohibits the temporary suspension of any permanent law.” Spot the key difference? The Senate rule applies to the entire Code of Laws while the House rule applies only to tax laws.
Lastly, a retired Senator gave great advice to many in the lobby: “It’s only a Rule 24 if someone raises the point of order.” This means unless a Senator raises a Rule 24 point of order, in theory a proviso could be adopted that is violative of the rule. We’ll see how many Rule 24s are raised this week.
3. Lock It
In the typical budget process there are four versions: the House version, the Senate version, the House second amendment version (often called H2), and the conference report. If a budget line item is the same amount in the H2 and Senate versions, it is considered “locked” unless the conference committee is given free conference powers by each chamber. If a budget proviso has the same language in the H2 and Senate versions, it is considered “locked” unless free conference powers are given to the conference committee. This is what state agencies and entities are always working towards: locking in their appropriations and provisos.
While it is common for some differences to exist between the first House version and H2, the number of changes often are small and not significant dollar amounts. If a state agency or entity has the same appropriation or proviso in the H2 and Senate versions, usually that is an excellent posture and very likely to be included in the enacted budget.
Another “locking mechanism” is the “clinch” maneuver. This parliamentary tactic is used to clinch or “lock-in” a vote on budget amendment or a whole section of the budget. Without the use of extraordinary parliamentary tactics, the clinch maneuver effectively ends amendments and debate for a particular vote. We’ll see if the clinch maneuver is used this week on the Senate floor.
