Floor Consideration of Conference Reports in the Senate

Floor Consideration of Conference Reports in the Senate

Order Code 98-737 GOV
Updated May 19, 2003
CRS Report for Congress
Received through the CRS Web
Floor Consideration of Conference Reports
in the Senate
James V. Saturno
Specialist on the Congress
Government and Finance Division
Filing Conference Reports
When a committee of conference approves its report, the next step in the legislative
process is for the report, along with a joint explanatory statement of the managers, to be
presented to the House and Senate for consideration. A conference report must be filed
and considered in one chamber at a time, when a chamber is in possession of the official
conference papers. In the Senate, Rule XXVIII allows conference reports to be presented
or filed at almost any time the chamber is in legislative session, provided that the Senate
is in possession of the conference papers. Exceptions to this procedure include a time
when the Journal is being read, a question of order or a motion to adjourn is pending,
during a quorum call, or while the Senate is voting. For more information on legislative
process, see [http://www.crs.gov/products/guides/guidehome.shtml].
The presentation of a conference report includes its reading, and a conference report
must be read on the demand of any Senator. Typically, the Senate routinely dispenses
with the reading by unanimous consent. Under a standing order adopted by the Senate
at the end of the 106th Congress, the reading of a conference report is not required if the
report is “available in the Senate.”
Under Senate Rule XXVIII, conference reports are required to be printed as Senate
reports. However, when a conference report has already been printed by the House, the
Senate also routinely dispenses with this requirement.
Debating Conference Reports
The consideration of a conference report is highly privileged, and, after it is read, a
conference report may be called up for consideration at almost any time another matter
is not pending. A motion to proceed to the consideration of a conference report is not
debatable. The conference report itself, however, is debatable, and consideration follows
normal Senate procedures.
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Senate Rule XXVIII, clause 5 provides that, if time for debate on the consideration
of a conference report is limited (by a unanimous consent agreement) the time allotted for
debate is to be equally divided and controlled by the majority and minority parties.
The chamber that agrees to a request for a conference is normally the one to consider
a conference report first. This is significant because the first chamber to act can agree or
disagree to a conference report, or it can agree to a preferential motion to recommit the
report to conference. However, after one chamber has acted on a report, its conferees are
discharged, and the other chamber may only accept or reject the conference report.
If the second house rejects a conference report, the measure is left in the procedural
situation it was in before the conference was requested. In such a circumstance, one
house could propose a new position to the other house as an amendment between the
houses, or it could request a new conference. In the event that a conference report is
recommitted or rejected and the measure submitted to a new conference committee, all
of the matters originally sent to conference are again before the conferees de novo for
consideration.
Points of Order
In the Senate, a point of order may be made against a conference report at any time
during its consideration prior to its adoption, but it cannot be made until after the
conference report has been read, or the reading dispensed with. Points of order may be
made against conference reports on a variety of grounds. For example, the limitations
established in the Congressional Budget Act generally apply to a conference report as well
as to a bill during initial consideration. Points of order that are either waived or not raised
during initial consideration are not implicitly waived for the conference report.
Senate Rule XXVIII provides that conferees may not “insert in their report matter
not committed to them by either House, nor shall they strike from the bill matter agreed
to by both Houses.” Any conference report to the contrary would be subject to a point of
order. When one house strikes everything after the enacting clause and inserts a substitute
for the entire bill the conferees have wide latitude to effect a compromise, and may report
any germane modification as long as it does not include new matter entirely irrelevant to
the subject of the bill sent to conference.
A point of order against a conference report is not debatable, although an appeal of
a ruling of the presiding officer would be. A point of order may only be made against the
conference report, and not against the language in the joint explanatory statement.
If the Senate is the first chamber to act on a conference report, the effect of a point
of order being sustained is for the conference report to be recommitted to the conference
committee. If the Senate is the second chamber to act on a conference report, the effect
of a successful point of order is that the conference report falls, and any further
consideration of the measure must follow some alternate route, in the same manner as if
the report had been defeated.