Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1917-07-03
A STEP FORWARD.

It appears that there is disposition
en- the part of a portion of the press
cf the state to criticise in no unmeas-
ured terms the alteration Of the rules
of the House of Representatives by the
special committee named by Speaker
Holder for this purpose. The report
Of this committee, embodying drastic
and radical changes in the rules of the
House, was adopted without dissent
ing vote.
The opposition to the new rules is
hardly justifable in the light of pasS
experiences in the lower branch of the
legislature. for no later than the last
session, it was fully demonstrated that
the existing rules provided too great
an opportunity for gag methods.
Representative Stephen Pace, of
Sumter county, was member of the
committee named by Speaker Holder to
submit new rules to govern the DELHI
erations of the House and it was he
who prepared the report which re-
ceived the final approval of the entire
body
1t will be recalled that while the
prohibition fight was on, an extra
session of the Legislature was made
necessary because the rules committee.
under the rules as they then existed,
fixed the order of business which could
mot be changed without unanimous con-
sent of the committee. The rules com
mittee, being anti-prohibition, would
fix the calendar and leave off the pro-
hibition bill. When member of the
House would request that the order of
business be changed and that the House
take up the consideration of the pro-
hibition bill, one member of the rules
committee could object, thus defeat
| ing the unanimous consent required to
change the order OF business.
Rule No. "a, covering this phase OF
the question, was changed so that a
vote of two-thirds of the rules com
mittee could change the order of bust
ness.
Another rule was changed so that in
the future. the House may change its
own rules by a two-thirds vote, in
stead of requiring a three-fourths vote
as previously. This alteration was
made for the reason that it has been
almost impossible in the past to change
any rule of the House when once
adopted, regardless of its merit or de-
merit
The alteration of another rule deal
iLg with proposed changes in the rules
o. the House, marks a distinct advance.
Under the provisions of the old rules
it was necessary to submit all pro
posed changes of the rules to the rules
committee, and it was also necessary
that this committee report back to the
House on such proposed change before
the matter could be acted upon by the
entire body In this way, in the past,
if the proposed change did not meet
with the approval of the rules COM
mittee, they would simply fail to re-
pert on the matter, automatically de-
feating the proposition. The amend
ment to this rule provides that the
rules committee shall report any pro-
posed change back to the House within
two days after it has been referred to
the committee; otherwise it will be
automatically returned to the House for
Probably one of the most radical
changes in the old rules is that re-
curing all committees to report on
bills referred to them within 10 days,
the measures may be with
Drawn from the committee on motion
of any member and placed before the
House for consideration. Under the
I'D order of things it was possible for
committee to kill a measure to which |
1 was unfavorable by the simple ex-
le6ient of falling 70 PpDOrt ii TO the |