I sent the following letter to Rep. Roy Blunt and Sens. Claire McCaskill and Christopher “Kit” Bond, in response to a note that the energy cap-and-trade bill was 932 pages long and when the Republicans requested it be read, the House leadership recruited a speed reader who read part of it and then the Democrats all had a good laugh. I personally do not see anything funny about that. What do you think?
Friends,
I may be a bit old-fashioned but I am from Missouri — I believe you were hired to make laws for the good of the nation. To do this, I believe you must understand a bill before voting on it. To this, I believe you must read or have read to you a bill before understanding it. I believe you should not vote on a bill unless you understand it. I am appalled at the necessity of there being a need to require that a bill be read in its entirety before a vote is taken, but if that is the only way that congressmen will read/hear and understand the bill, then so be it.
I personally am taking online training for my new job and if I say I have completed a part of the course, I have completed it and read it. I think you should too. Having a staffer read it and summarize it is nice but does not address details that the staffer will leave out.
So, I support a bill requiring the reading (not by a speed reader as a joke) of a bill in its entirety before a vote is taken.
P.S.: I understand this may reduce the number of bills and/or their complicated nature — that is not necessarily a bad thing.
David Pritchard
Carthage
Opinion
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