Smith Calls for Transparency Reform in U.S. House

HIXSON, September 23 – Third District Congressional Candidate Robin Smith today called upon members of the House to join in the bipartisan effort to change the rules in the House of Representatives to require that legislation be posted on the internet for 72 hours before a vote is taken on final passage. Today, Congressmen Greg Walden (R-OR), John Culberson (R-TX) and Brian Baird (D-WA) filed a “discharge petition” in the House.  If this bipartisan discharge petition receives the signatures of any 218 House members, legislation mandating the rule change will come to the House floor.

“In this age of instant information, it is unacceptable that the House would not give Americans the opportunity to see the legislation they vote on,” Smith said. “We saw during the town halls that average citizens were often better informed than congressmen on the details of the various healthcare proposals because they were willing to work to find copies of the bills. A government that respects its citizens will make it easier for us to obtain this information.

Unfortunately the current Congress seems inclined to hide the facts on legislation from the people. On one occasion a committee chairman joked that the bills are too long to bother reading. If members of Congress won’t do their jobs and read the bills, at least give us the opportunity to do it for them.”

Smith noted the immediate relevance to allowing citizens to read the bills with today’s news that Senate democrats have rejected a similar amendment that would have placed the final version of the health care bill online for review. “On both sides of the Capitol, there seems to be an effort to ram through the government takeover of healthcare without debate or dissent. Americans clearly said in August that we are tired of double talk, midnight bill drops, mysterious amendments and politicians who want to turn over 1/6 of our economy to the government without reading the bill. Congress needs to spendless time hiding from the American people and more time listening to our concerns.”