Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 6, Number 10, 1 October 1989 — Mai Wakinekona [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Mai Wakinekona

By Paul Alexander Washington, D.C. Counsel for OHA

Understanding the legislative process in Congress

This summer's historic Congressional hearings on the Hawaiian Homes Act produced many thousands of pages of transcripts and exhibits. Many people spent long hours considering what to say and how to say it. lt was an enormous effort by everyone involved. Testimony ranged from issues of fundamental importance, such as the proper and future status of Native Hawaiians as a self-governing people, to important but more limited practical issues such as how to repair improperly constructed Homestead housing. The August hearings were what is known as "oversight" hearings." It is through oversight hearings that Congress studies how the laws it has passed are working and/or if new laws, or changes in existing laws, are needed. At oversight hearings, specific drafts of new legislation are not usually considered. These congressional hearings have, no doubt, raised hopes and expectations for change and progress in the Native Hawaiian community. In order to achieve change it will be necessary to embark on a long-term and complicated legislative process in the halls of Congress. This legislative process of moving from problem identification to consensus on legislative solutions requires a working knowledge of the institutions and ways of Congress. This eolumn will, over the next few months, review some of the key concepts and terms affecting the "legislative process." The word "Congress" refers both to the combination of the House of Representatives and the Senate of the United States, and the legislative period made of two one-year sessions. The current Congress is the 101st. In every Congress, only a few hundred of the many thousands of bills introduced actually become law. Frequently those bills that become law have been worked on for several sessions. Because of the Congress' unique responsibilities for Native issues, a disproportionate number of bills relate to Native issues. This does not mean that Native issues are high priorities for all members of Congress. Although from time to time a Native issue ean become the focus of major congressional debate and nationwide attention, such instances are rare. Usually Native issues are the primary eoneem of the loeal congressional delegation and the congressionaI eom-

mittees with jurisdiction over the specific Native issue. The committee structure of Congress is the major battleground for Native issues. For our purposes, Congress has three distinct but overlapping functions and the committee structure reflects those functions. Authorizing legislation refers to those bills that create, modify, or terminate rights and obligations. These bills may authorize money to be spent to achieve the bills' purposes, but they do not themselves spend any money. Technically, appropriations are annual spending bills for a particular (fiscal) year for the programs that have been created by authorizing legislation. Appropriations bi!ls also ean create or modify programs. The process is called legislating by appropriations. When Congress is unable to pass specific appropriations bills, it often combines all the appropriations bills together into legislation known as the Continuing Resolution, referred to as the CR. Without annual appropriations the govemment cannot operate. Oversight, as noted earlier, is the review of existing programs and issues to determine if legislative changes are needed. The primary authorizing committees for Native issues are the Senate Select Committee on Indian Affairs and the House Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs. In the House of Representatives, the Education Labor Committee has jurisdiction over Native education programs. The Energy and Commerce Committee shares jurisdiction over health issues with the Interior and Insular Affairs Committee. All authorizing committees also have oversight jurisdiction. There are also committees that only have oversight responsibility, but no authorizing authority; an example of such a committee is the Select Committee on Aging. There are separate Appropriations Committees, one in the Senate and one in the House of Representatives. Eaeh of these committees has subcommittees whieh is where mueh of the decisionmaking occurs. In the Senate Appropriations Committee, the Subcommittee on Interior and Related Agencies funds most of the Indian pro-

grams. Most of the Native Hawaiian programs, however, are funded through the Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies. Senator Daniel K. Inouye is a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and is on this subcommittee as well as other subcommittees. There is a similar subcommittee structure in the House of Representatives and Congressman Daniel K. Akaka is a member of the House of Appropriations Committee. Paul Alexander is legislatiue counsel to OHA in Washington, D.C. He is a partner in Alexander& Karshmer of California and the District of Colombia, a law firm specializing in natiue Amenean rights. He is former staff director of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Indian Affairs. He is the author of "The Nature of the Federal-Natiue Hawaiian Relationship" whieh was used by eongress for the Native Hawaiian Education Amendment and the Naiiue Hawaiian Healih Care Act.