THE CASE AGAINST LYNN JENKINS CHAPTER 57 - H.R. 339, A LAME BILL THAT DOESN'T END LAME DUCK SESSIONS AND IGNORES THE CONSTITUTION

This is Lynn Jenkins, she doesn't represent us, and she doesn't understand the Constitution

Having invented a new Holocaust,

And been the first with it to win a war,

How they make haste to cry with fingers crossed,

King's X—no fair to use it any more!

                                               -Robert Frost

H.R. 339, the much ballyhooed Lynn Jenkins opus, the End the Lame Duck Act has been filed in the House.  Jenkins managed to get 26 other Members of Congress to sign on to this poorly crafted bit of propaganda.  It is as though these 27 Representatives are waving a flag proclaiming their utter ignorance of the Constitution.  This is not a good bill.

The bill starts off with a big exception. We are going to adjourn sine die if we are properly adjourned on election day. Even a blind elephant can stumble around that exception. So this is the end the Lame Duck Session Maybe Bill. Of course Jenkins didn't really mean to say that the lame duck session would be ended. Of course not, she wrote in even more exceptions.

The first exception shines a bright light on Jenkins' failure to understand the Constitution and the Congress as an institution. Her first formal exception deals with counting electors. Gee, that's great. Jenkins wants the lame duck Congress to cast votes in the archaic process of formally electing the President and Vice President.  The language of her bill says "(1) COUNTING OF ELECTORS- Nothing in subsection (a) shall be construed to prohibit the Congress from meeting to count electoral votes pursuant to section 15 of title 3, United States Code."  Read the full text at Thomas, the web site for the Library of Congress at: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c112:H.R.339:.


Two problems with Lynn's Lame Bill. The first problem takes us back to the Twentieth Amendment to the Constitution. That was the change to the Constitution where the start of the new Congress was accelerated to January 3rd following the general election for a new Congress every two years and for President and Vice President every four years. Remember that date, January 3rd.

The second problem, again of Constitutional dimension, is that the counting of the votes of the electoral college are governed under the Twelfth Amendment to the Constitution . This Amendment does not allow the former Congress to have any authority in the counting of the votes of the electors. What is really pathetic about this section of Jenkins' opus is that she correctly references the federal statute codifying the appropriate provision of the Twelfth Amendment, 3 U.S.C. § 15.  That law begins: 

"Congress shall be in session on the sixth day of January succeeding every meeting of the electors. The Senate and House of Representatives shall meet in the Hall of the House of Representatives at the hour of 1 o’clock in the afternoon on that day, and the President of the Senate shall be their presiding officer."

If the new Congress starts on January 3rd, as the Twentieth Amendment says it does, and the Congress meets on January 6th to perform their roll in counting the votes of the electors of the Electoral College, then H.R. 339 doesn't make any sense.  H.R. 339 doesn't make any sense.  You'd think a person claiming to be a Certified Public Accountant would be good enough at math to know that 6 follows 3. 

Which goes to show that you can read the Constitution on the floor of the House but you can't get Members to understand it. The new Congress, not the former, counts the votes of the electors. Jenkins just gets it wrong, as usual.

Now when Jenkins says the Congress is to adjourn sine die she didn't really mean it. She meant that it would adjourn for good if and only if the:

the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the majority leader of the Senate, or their respective designees, acting jointly and with the written agreement of the minority leader of the House and the minority leader of the Senate, may notify the Members of the House and Senate, respectively, to reassemble if each determines that it is in the interest of the United States to do so.

So if those in the driver's seat just got tossed out, then maybe they'd see it in the nation's interest to keep legislating up to the bitter end. That way they can get everything done they want to get done.

Of course Jenkins wouldn't want the government to have any money problems while the Congress is dormant. That's why she provides for AUTOMATIC CONTINUING APPROPRIATIONS in her bill. This section seems to undercut the reasoning for not having lame duck sessions. Consider that the electorate, We the People, may be fed up with the spending habits of a given Congress and vote to throw the rascals out. What good is it to have thrown out the rascals only to have their spending policies put on automatic pilot?

H.R. 339 reminds me of Robert Frost's poem Kings X. Jenkins' crosses her fingers and cries "Kings X" only we can end the lame duck session when and if we want to end the lame duck session. And the money keeps getting spent on automatic pilot. "King's X, only kidding, didn't really mean it" is what Jenkins seems to be saying. HR. 339 is a really bad bill.

THE CASE AGAINST LYNN JENKINS CHAPTER 55 - WHEN DIGGING HERSELF INTO A HOLE SHE KEEPS DIGGING AND ASKS YOU TO CONTRIBUTE YOUR MONEY TO THE NONSENSE

This is Lynn Jenkins, she does not represent us

Common Sense, and nearly every person you meet, will tell you to stop digging once you find yourself in a hole. Either no one told Lynn Jenkins about common sense or that she's dug herself into a hole. Instead of dropping the shovel and hollering for a ladder or a rope Jenkins decided to blame "liberals" for her confused idea about a statute to outlaw Lame Duck sessions of the Congress - any Congress.

Seriously, when I Googled the Unrepresentative from Kansas' Second Congressional District this is what I saw:

End the Lame Duck Session

Liberals are fighting my attempt to ban the lame duck session.

www.lynnjenkins.com  



That of course took me to a page where Lynn had the audacity to ask for more money. She gets tens of thousands of dollars from her connections with the  Koch's brothers, QC Holdings, and other FAT CAT BANKERS, ACCOUNTANTS, INSURANCE COMPANIES, AND WALL STREET INTERESTS. She'll neither get a vote nor a single cent from me.

Am I supposed to be this "liberal" of which her website speak?  On some things I am. I support equal pay for equal work, SCHIP, Health Care Reform, and a woman's right to choose. Then again I never saw a free trade agreement that didn't free up our markets to buy more cheap stuff, made by foreigners and putting Americans out of work that I liked. Nor do I think much of tax credits to big business for sending American jobs overseas. Jenkins keeps voting for those offshoring tax breaks.  When it comes to the Second Amendment I find myself strangely in the company of Sam Alito. I think owning a gun is a personal right guaranteed by the Second Amendment and that right can be made applicable to the States via the Incorporation Doctrine of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Lynn Jenkins just gets it wrong. It is not liberals who oppose her idea, it is reasonable persons who have taken the time to study the institution of the Congress and the Constitution. Jenkins will be opposed by those who know the distinctions between rules, statutes, and the Constitution.

The Constitution

Article I Section 4.

The times, places and manner of holding elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each state by the legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by law make or alter such regulations, except as to the places of choosing Senators.

The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such meeting shall be on the first Monday in December, unless they shall by law appoint a different day.

20th Amendment - Amendment XX

Section 2.

The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such meeting shall begin at noon on the 3d day of January, unless they shall by law appoint a different day.

The Twentieth Amendment struck out the language I underlined above from  Article I § 4 and replaced it with the language of § 2.

If the 72nd Congress, which proposed the Twentieth Amendment, and the States ratifying the Twentieth Amendment intended to terminate, rather than truncate, Lame Duck sessions then the language they presented would have been different.

Consider the original language of Article I § 3, which was redacted upon adoption of the Seventeenth Amendment. Here the framers told the first Senators to get themselves to Philadelphia to begin the first session of the First Congress and to do so immediately. If the powerhouse behind the Twentieth Amendment, Nebraska's Senator George Norris, wanted to kick the former Representatives and Senators out of office and let the new Congress begin, there was an example set by the Founding Fathers.

The Twentieth Amendment would then say that as soon as a quorum of both houses of the newly elected Congress has assembled, the former Congress will adjourn Sine Die. Immediately thereafter the next session of Congress will begin.

The problem is that isn't anything close to what the Twentieth Amendment says.

Lynn Jenkins is having this amazingly public brain fart saying that she can get done by statute what every other semi-educated person in America knows can only be accomplished by amending the Constitution.

This is not new stuff. The Supreme Court spoke to the issue in 1996. The case was United States v. Winstar Corp. 518 U.S. 839 where the history of this principle was discussed. The Court said:

In his Commentaries, Blackstone stated the centuries old concept that one legislature may not bind the legislative authority of its successors:

"Acts of parliament derogatory from the power of subsequent parliaments bind not. . . . Because the legislature, being in truth the sovereign power, is always of equal, always of absolute authority: it acknowledges no superior upon earth, which the prior legislature must have been, if it's [sic] ordinances could bind the present parliament." 1 W. Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England 90 (1765)." (Emphasis added).

Did you get that? Lynn Jenkins cannot pass a law that binds future Congresses because the 112th Congress will be equal in sovereign power and absolute authority with the 113th Congress and each successive Congress to follow.

Make no bones about it the 112th Congress can adjourn Sine Die after the elections are over. The 112th Congress can move to make in order a new vote for Speaker of the House for the balance of the term of the first session of the 112th Congress. That way when the Democrats win Lynn Jenkins can make sure that the Democrats will rule in the waning hours of the 112th Congress and respect the will of the electorate. Lynn Jenkins' crazy idea that she can pass a law binding on future Congresses regarding Lame Duck sessions is just nonsense.

It is the kind of nonsense that has her asking for money from those who believe that liberals are attacking Jenkins. Well, Jenkins may not know much about Congress as an institution or the Constitution but she's a true disciple of P.T. Barnum. Yes Sir, there's a sucker born every minute! And Lynn is going after their cash!

And now Jenkins supports the new Tea Party notion of putting in a Constitutional jurisdictional statement for each new bill proposed in the 112th Congress.  Gosh, I can hardly wait.

The Lame Duck 111th Congress kicks off lamely demonstrating that Representative Paul Broun is the Lamest Duck of All

Will the lame duck session of the 111th Congress be a do-nothing session? It's starting off that way. The session opened yesterday with the House considering two perfunctory, could-have-been-done-anytime, safe, and polite measures. You'd have to think that the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, looked to her old comrades in arms and said give me a couple of pitches, soft and belt-high, so we can knock a couple out of the park and go home early.

The first measure the lame duckers took up was H. Res. 1713, a bill titled "Recognizing the 50th anniversary of Ruby Bridges desegregating a previously all-White public elementary school" which was introduced by Georgia's Democratic Representative John Lewis. When I say introduced, it was introduced - first seen- yesterday.

The Problem We All Live With, by Norman Rockwell

Ruby Nell Bridges was the little girl depicted by a famous Norman Rockwell panting called "The Problem We All Live With". H. Res. 1713 passed by a margin of 385 to 1 with 46 Representative not voting on roll call 567. The sole negative vote came from another Georgia Representative, Republican Paul Broun, Jr. Representative Broun has been busy earning himself a reputation as a wing-nut. He voted against H.R. 5566, a bill to banning "crush" videos, which depict animal cruelty. He has called the President a socialist, comparing the President to Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin. He has made outrageous allegations against the Council on American Islamic Relations, This is the man who said the Center for Disease Control was going to call Americans on the phone to force them to eat more fruits and vegetables.

I think if Norman Rockwell were still alive he might paint a picture of Georgia's atavistic Republican Representative Paul Broun  calling it "The Problem We All Live With".

H. Con. Res. 328 was the second order of business in the House yesterday. H. Con. Res. 328 is another bill introduced for the first time yesterday. The measure called, "Expressing the sense of the Congress regarding the successful and substantial contributions of the amendments to the patent and trademark laws that were initially enacted in 1980 by Public Law 96-517 (commonly referred to as the "Bayh-Dole Act") on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of its enactment", was introduced by Michigan's Democratic Representative John Conyers, Jr. The margin of victory for H. Con. Res. 328 was 385 to 1 with 46 Members of Congress not voting. Apparently Representative Broun has "just say no" stuck in his head as he again cast the House's sole negative vote. I bet his report card from elementary school contained comments like "Paul does not get along well with others."