Pennsylvania Code › Title 101 - GENERAL ASSEMBLY › Part I - LEGISLATIVE REFERENCE BUREAU › Subpart D - PENNSYLVANIA CONSOLIDATED STATUTES STYLE MANUAL › Chapter 23 - FORMAT AND STYLE › Subchapter D - SPECIAL RULES FOR AMENDMENTS › Section 23.241 - Scope of amendment

Current through Register Vol. 54, No. 28, July 13, 2024
(a)
Background.
-Section 3 of Article III of the Constitution of
					 Pennsylvania, as amended by referendum of May 16, 1967, provides that no bill
					 shall be passed containing more than one subject, which shall be clearly
					 expressed in its title, except a general appropriation bill or a bill codifying
					 or compiling the law or a part thereof. The statute enacting the Statutes and
					 to which all amendments are made is entitled "An act codifying and compiling a
					 part of the law of the Commonwealth." In his "Introduction to the Pennsylvania
					 Consolidated Statutes" contained in Title 1 (General Provisions) of the
					 Statutes as published in Purdon's Statutes, William E. Zeiter interprets the
					 constitutional provision to require that amendments to the Statutes must
					 satisfy the single subject title requirement to the extent they are more than
					 mere codifications (
i.e.
reduction of unwritten case law to
					 statutory law) or compilations (
i.e.
transfer of existing
					 statutory provisions unchanged to code format) and make any change in
					 substantive law. Thus, a bill to change the law on one subject would be valid
					 even though it also codified or compiled without change in substantive law
					 existing law on one or more additional subjects but a bill changing the law on
					 two or more subjects would be unconstitutional. However, the practice of
					 including more than one subject in a bill that makes changes in substantive law
					 should be avoided even though it might otherwise be constitutional.
(b)
Determination of one
					 subject.
-In general, the headings of the various titles of the
					 Statutes will serve as a sufficient reference for classifying the subject thus
					 permitting amendments to any of the provisions of the particular title
					 resulting in a change in substantive law. At the same time, conforming
					 amendments changing substantive law may be made to titles other than the
					 principal title being amended so long as they relate to the same subject. On
					 the other hand, certain titles (
e.g.
Titles 1 (General
					 Provisions), 69 (Savings and Validating Provisions) and 79 (Supplementary
					 Provisions)) are broad in scope and may not sufficiently identify the subject
					 to permit comprehensive amendments to the particular title. In such cases,
					 amendments will be limited to a particular part of the title and may or may not
					 be accompanied by a corresponding amendment to a title containing the principal
					 subject of the amendment.
(c)
General rule.
-Except as provided in subsection (d), a bill may
					 amend one or more titles of the Statutes and may relate to more than one
					 subject.
(d)
Revision of
					 substantive law.
-The particular provisions of a bill which revise the
					 substantive law must be limited to one subject.
This section cited in 101 Pa. Code §
													23.242 (relating to title of
						  amendatory bill).