Article I, Section 7, clause 1 of the U.S. Constitution, is known generally as the "Origination Clause" because it requires that All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with amendments as on other Bills. As generally understood in both the House and Senate, this clause carries two kinds of prohibitions. First, the Senate may not originate any measure that includes a provision for raising revenue, and second, the Senate may not propose any amendment that would raise revenue to a non-revenue measure. The Senate, however, may generally amend a House-originated revenue measure as it sees fit. These prohibitions can be enforced in either the House or the Senate, and there are ample precedents for both. As with many provisions of the Constitution, the precise meaning and application of these few words has been refined through practice and precedent since it was first ratified. This report examines the historical record with regard to the origins of the clause, and analyzes its evolution, describing congressional and court precedents, to provide a summary of how the clause is currently understood. This report also examines the various procedures by which disputes concerning the Origination Clause have been resolved. Among the most significant issues debated at the constitutional convention in Philadelphia were those relating to the respective roles for the proposed House of Representatives and Senate. Vesting the authority to originate revenue measures in the House exclusively was one aspect of the compromise whereby delegates from small and large States agreed in principle to a bicameral Congress. What role each chamber would play, and what authority each would exercise, was not easily arrived at. In particular, how authority would be assigned with regard to legislation concerning money was one of the more salient aspects of that debate. The idea that some or all money bills should originate in the popularly elected chamber of the legislature was a product of British and colonial experience, an experience that had been rekindled when the newly independent states adopted new constitutions in 1776 or shortly thereafter. A number of delegates to the Philadelphia Convention felt strongly that, for the federal government, the power to originate money bills should also reside solely in the House of Representatives, because it, unlike the Senate, would be directly elected by people. In the words of Elbridge Gerry, a delegate to the convention from Massachusetts: Taxation and representation are strongly associated in the minds of the people, and they will not agree that any but their immediate representatives shall meddle with their purses. As first proposed by Gerry on June 13, 1787, the convention rejected, 3-8, a proposal to add language providing that "money bills ... shall originate in the first branch of the national legislature." The issue was addressed again by the Compromise Committee on Representation, chaired by Gerry, on July 3. The committee's report recommended that [A]ll Bills for raising or appropriating money and for fixing the salaries of the Officers of the Government of the United States, shall originate in the first Branch of the Legislature, and shall not be altered or amended by the second Branch—and that no money shall be drawn from the public Treasury but in pursuance of appropriations to be originated by the first Branch. This proposal was paired by the committee with one providing that "in the second Branch of the Legislature each State shall have an equal Vote." This time the convention voted, 5-3, to retain the restriction. On August 8, the question was raised again on the grounds that the provision unnecessarily restricted the legislative role of the Senate. Although George Mason of Virginia feared that striking the provision could "unhinge the compromise of which it made a part," the convention voted, 7-4, to strike it. Edmund Randolph of Virginia subsequently suggested that the problem of the earlier language was that it could be interpreted so broadly that it could apply to legislation that only incidentally raised money, and proposed modifying it. His proposal made the language more specific regarding what legislation the Senate might originate, prohibiting only "bills for raising money for the purpose of revenue or for appropriating the same." However, the same proposal also included language to restrict the Senate's role in considering such legislation by providing that it could not be "amended or altered by the Senate as to increase or diminish the sum to be raised, or change the mode of levying it, or the object of its appropriation." Randolph's arguments invoked the clause's part in the compromise which had given the smaller States equal representation in the Senate, and called on them to support the proposal. On August 11, he successfully moved that the convention to reconsider the question, but on August 13 the new language was rejected, 4-7. On August 15, Caleb Strong of Massachusetts again raised the question of the original Gerry language, this time altered to allow the Senate to "propose or concur with amendments as in other cases." The convention postponed deciding the question that day, and again on September 5. Finally, on September 8, the language of Strong's proposal was revised, and the Origination Clause was adopted by the convention, 9-2, in the form that was later ratified. Although the application of the Origination Clause was discussed at the Philadelphia convention, the Constitution does not provide specific guidelines as to what constitutes a bill for raising revenue. The meaning of a "Bill for raising Revenue" is therefore a question of interpretation. As a result, Congress and federal courts both have played roles in establishing the precedents that guide interpretation and application of the Origination Clause. As it is the House that is most frequently called upon to enforce the Origination Clause, its precedents have played a primary role in defining what makes a bill for raising revenue. The rules and practices of the House use the concept of "revenue" in two separate, but related, procedures. First, in connection with enforcing House prerogatives under the Origination Clause when considering a resolution to return a bill to the Senate (a "blue-slip resolution"), and second, when enforcing within the House the exclusive jurisdiction of the House Committee on Ways and Means over all measures "carrying a tax or tariff." The connection between the two uses is made explicit when, at the beginning of each Congress, the Speaker of the House enunciates certain policies with respect to several aspects of the legislative process. One of these policies concerns "guidance concerning the referral of bills, to assist committees in staying within their appropriate jurisdictions ... and to protect the constitutional prerogative of the House to originate revenue bills." In both instances the House applies a broad standard, based on whether the measure in question has revenue-affecting potential, and not simply whether it would raise or lower revenues directly. For example, any change in import restrictions may be regarded by the House as falling within the purview of the Origination Clause, because it could have an impact on tariff revenues. In 1992, the House returned to the Senate a bill ( S. 884 , 102 nd Congress) to require the President to impose economic sanctions, including a ban on certain imports, against countries which fail to eliminate large-scale driftnet fishing. In 1999, the House returned to the Senate a bill ( S. 254 , 105 th Congress) effectively banning the import of certain assault weapon attachments. House precedent, as articulated by the policy of recent Speakers of the House, construes the chamber's prerogatives broadly to include "any meaningful revenue proposal," but may also include other types of receipts which may not fall strictly within a technical definition of revenues. This interpretation is framed by the Speaker in terms of House committee jurisdictions and referrals, but it also informs the House's understanding of what constitutes non-revenue receipts that are not subject to the Origination Clause. While the House rules grant exclusive jurisdiction over revenues to the Ways and Means Committee, they also allow for various other standing committees of the House to consider legislation concerning non-revenue receipts, such as: user, regulatory and other fees, charges, and assessments levied on a class directly availing itself of, or directly subject to, a governmental service, program, or activity, but not on the general public, as measures to be utilized solely to support, subject to annual appropriations, the service, program, or activity ... for which such fees, charges, and assessments are established and collected and not to finance the costs of Government generally. The fee must be paid by a class benefitting from the service, program or activity, or being regulated by the agency; in short, there must be a reasonable connection between the payors and the agency or function receiving the fee. One example of the distinction between revenue and non-revenue receipts having an impact on the House's interpretation of the Origination Clause is the case of S. 104 (105 th Congress). This legislation would have repealed one fee and replaced it with another. It was the repeal of the original fee, but not Senate origination of a new fee, that triggered House action. The new fee was to be limited to the amount appropriated to cover the cost of nuclear waste disposal. Due to the fact that the new fee was tied to the actual cost of the activity, and was to be borne by the entities directly involved, the House did not question the Senate's authority to originate it. The proceeds from the original fee, however, were uncapped, and fees collected in excess of the associated costs were deposited in the general fund in the Treasury and used to finance the federal government generally. Repeal of the original fee was determined by the House to have a direct impact on revenues, and therefore subject to the Origination Clause, resulting in the measure being blue-slipped. Overall, House precedents indicate a wide spectrum of tax and tariff actions that have been excluded on the basis of the Origination Clause.