The spending plan passed in a familiar scramble in the final hours of the 104th Illinois General Assembly.
Lawmakers broke the rules again to pass a state budget after 4 a.m. Monday.
They’ll get away with it, as usual.
Despite the proposed budget being available three weeks ago, the final package was amended and passed in an end-of-session dash.
The process played out in familiar fashion, with lawmakers waiting until the last hours to amend and pass the record-high budget of more than 3,700 pages, which included the implementation and revenue bills.
The time to review, vet and debate the budget was reduced to just hours after midnight. The voting concluded at 4:13 a.m. Monday, June 1.
It is lawmakers’ duty to understand the legislation they vote on, but does anyone really think they read everything in a few hours?
The short time to review a budget can deter debate and largely eliminates opportunity for scrutiny from taxpayers and lawmakers. The tactic is used despite laws governing the bill process.
The Illinois Constitution requires that bills be read on three separate days before they are voted on. That’s meant to give lawmakers — and taxpayers — a chance to know what is in a bill. But lawmakers regularly insert hundreds or thousands of pages unrelated to the original bill and pass it the same day.
Why are they allowed to do something clearly prohibited by the state Constitution? Illinois courts adhere to what is known as the “enrolled bill doctrine,” meaning courts defer to state House and Senate leaders to determine whether all procedural requirements for passing a bill have been met.
In practice, this means the three-day reading requirement is never enforced and that lawmakers must vote on bills they had little to no chance to read. These bills cannot face real scrutiny until after the fact.
Lawmakers should follow the laws in place to ensure they have time to fully understand the bills affecting their constituents.
