Norton's First Bill of the Year to Give D.C. Legislative Autonomy

Press Release

Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) today introduced the District of Columbia Paperwork Reduction Act to eliminate the congressional review period for legislation passed by the D.C. Council. In her statement introducing the bill, Norton said, "The congressional review process for D.C. bills provides no benefit to Congress, but imposes substantial costs (in time and money) on the District. Indeed, Congress effectively abandoned the congressional review process as a mechanism for overturning D.C. legislation twenty-three years ago, yet it still requires the D.C. Council to use Kafkaesque make-work procedures to comply with the abandoned congressional review process established by the Home Rule Act of 1973." Because the congressional review period is limited only to those days when both chambers are in session, D.C. bills often do not become final for many months. That forces the D.C. Council to pass most legislation several times over, using a cumbersome and complicated process to keep bills alive. Instead of using the congressional review period to overturn D.C. legislation, Congress instead has long used attachments to the D.C. appropriations bill.

"Congress constantly decries excessive paperwork in government and passes several bills in committee or on the floor to reduce or eliminate paperwork every year," said Norton. "Yet, during my service in Congress, I have never seen a more Sisyphus-like paperwork regime than the congressional requirement for the D.C. Council to needlessly submit never-reviewed legislation to Congress for required layover periods. It is time Congress practices what it preaches." Norton believes she can get bipartisan support for her bill, particularly in the Senate.

Currently, there is a required congressional review period for civil and criminal legislation passed by the District of Columbia (30 legislative days for civil and 60 legislative days for criminal). If a congressional resolution disproving a D.C. bill is signed into law during the congressional review period, that bill does not become law. Since the 1973 Home Rule Act, of the more than 4,500 legislative acts transmitted to Congress, only three resolutions to disapprove a D.C. bill have been enacted -- in 1979, 1981, and 1991 -- and two of those involved distinct federal interests.

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