Diagramming how a bill becomes a law in the U.S.

What we're going to do in this video is diagram out how a bill can become a law. I make a distinction between a non-tax bill and a tax bill. A non-tax bill can be introduced into either chamber of Congress initially; it could be introduced into the Senate or it can be introduced into the House of Representatives.

While something that deals with taxation can only be introduced initially into the House of Representatives. As we've talked about in other videos, anyone can be involved in the drafting of a bill, but it actually needs to be introduced into the appropriate chamber by a member of that chamber.

But let's say that it gets introduced into the Senate. What happens then? Well, it will be referred to the appropriate committee. And what is the appropriate committee? Well, if it deals with foreign relations, it would go to the Foreign Relations Committee. If it deals with the Armed Services, well, it would go to the Armed Services Committee. You get the general idea.

Now, in the committee, they might have hearings; they might debate it. If they decide to debate it and have a vote on it, it could pass. So, let's say it passes through the committee, and then the majority leader—and the majority leader is the leader of the majority party in the Senate—they have a lot of influence on how and when that bill gets debated on the Senate floor.

But let's say that they schedule it for debate on the Senate floor. Once things get to a vote on the Senate floor, they need a simple majority to pass. So, let's say that this bill passes. And I know what you're thinking; you might have heard numbers like 60 out of 100 votes or a two-thirds majority, where the two-thirds is necessary to ratify a treaty.

The 60 votes—that's necessary for cloture to end most filibusters. So, functionally, it often does require more than simple majority support in order to get even to a vote. But let's say that this bill that was initially introduced into the Senate makes it all the way through. What happens then?

Well, if there isn't a similar bill that was introduced into the House of Representatives and got through the House of Representatives, this bill would then go through a similar process in the House. So then this bill would go all the way, would be introduced into the House of Representatives. It would be referred to the appropriate committee, and then once it passes through the appropriate committee, it would go through the Rules Committee.

The Rules Committee is one of these major distinctions between the House and the Senate. The Senate does have a Rules Committee, but it is nowhere near as powerful. In the House, the Rules Committee can control a lot; it can decide when and how or even whether a bill even gets to the floor.

But let's say it does get to the floor, and then it gets a simple majority of the House members to vote for it. Well, then this bill would then go to the president. Now, some interesting things happen once it gets to the president. The president can, of course, decide to sign the bill, so then sign the bill, in which case that bill will become law.

The president could also decide to veto the bill. Now, if the president vetoes the bill, it would go back to the chamber in which it originated. In this first example that we were talking about, that vetoed bill would go back to the Senate.

In order to override the veto, they would need a two-thirds majority. Even if they were able to get the two-thirds right over here, it still wouldn't become a law. Then it would have to get the two-thirds in the House. But if it was able to get the two-thirds there as well, well then, they have overridden the president's veto, and it will become a law.

Now, there are other edge cases that involve the president. If a president does nothing for 10 days, and if Congress is in session for those 10 days, well then it can become a law. So, nothing for 10 days—well then, you can also make it a law.

There's also something called a pocket veto, where the president does nothing, but the Congress goes out of session within that 10 days. So let me do this: this would be a pocket pocket veto right over here, and I'll just put that in quotes because that's also the president doing nothing, but Congress goes out of session within those 10 days.

Now, one thing to be clear—even what I've drawn here is a simplification. There are many steps in this process where a bill could change, where a bill could die, or a bill could just go into some sort of a limbo state.

For example, a committee can decide to add to a bill; that would be called amending a bill, so that could happen over there. It can actually happen in other places; maybe a bill does not pass through committee, not pass. Maybe it does not pass through the floor action.

Maybe it doesn't go. Maybe it doesn't pass the House committee; maybe it doesn't pass through the House. All of these places are where a bill could die. There's also situations where a committee could decide to table a bill, which is not saying that we have voted against it, but they're saying, "Hey, we're not even going to vote on it," and it just goes into a little bit of limbo.

But essentially, the bill will die there, so it could get tabled in committee in either chamber. Even the Rules Committee could decide to table it, so it never really makes its way to a vote on the floor.

Now, it's also important to note that in the example we gave, a bill started in the Senate, made its way through the Senate, and then had to make its way through the House and eventually got to the president's desk. It could have gone the other way; it could have started in the House of Representatives.

In fact, if it's a tax bill, it would have had to start in the House of Representatives. And if it got all the way through the House, then it would have gone to the Senate. It would have to go all the way through the Senate, and then it would end up on the president's desk.

Oftentimes, you have a situation where two parallel bills are making their way through each chamber. So, there could be a bill that's making its way through the Senate, say on immigration, and there could be a parallel bill on immigration making its way through the House of Representatives.

Now, if each of those bills gets through their respective chambers, then they go to something called a conference committee. A conference committee is a place where both representatives and senators of the appropriate committees will get together and make their bills gel together.

Now, even if they're able to agree to a unified bill, so to speak, one that sinks the two bills that went through both chambers, then that synced bill would once again have to go through both chambers again. So, it's not like the conference committee can just decide.

Even what I've drawn here is a simplification. There's all of this—whether you consider it interesting or not—parliamentary procedure and nuances that allow different players, especially the leadership in each of the houses, to have a lot of levers to either accelerate the passage of a bill or to kill it in different ways.