[Congressional Bills 107th Congress] [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office] [S. Res. 8 Agreed to Senate (ATS)] 107th CONGRESS 1st Session S. RES. 8 Relative to Senate procedure in the 107th Congress. _______________________________________________________________________ IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES January 5, 2001 Mr. Daschle (for himself and Mr. Lott) submitted the following resolution; which was considered and agreed to _______________________________________________________________________ RESOLUTION Relative to Senate procedure in the 107th Congress. Resolved, That notwithstanding the provisions of rule XXV, or any other provision of the Standing Rules or Standing Orders of the Senate, the committees of the Senate, including Joint and Special Committees, for the 107th Congress shall be composed equally of members of both parties, to be appointed at a later time by the two Leaders; that the budgets and office space for such committees, and all other subgroups, shall likewise be equal, with up to an additional 10 percent to be allocated for administrative expenses to be determined by the Rules Committee, with the total administrative expenses allocation for all committees not to exceed historic levels; and that the Chairman of a full committee may discharge a subcommittee of any Legislative or Executive Calendar item which has not been reported because of a tie vote and place it on the full committee's agenda. Sec. 2. Provided, That such committee ratios shall remain in effect for the remainder of the 107th Congress, except that if at any time during the 107th Congress either party attains a majority of the whole number of Senators, then each committee ratio shall be adjusted to reflect the ratio of the parties in the Senate, and the provisions of this resolution shall have no further effect, except that the members appointed by the two Leaders, pursuant to this resolution, shall no longer be members of the committees, and the committee chairmanships shall be held by the party which has attained a majority of the whole number of Senators. Sec. 3. Pursuant to the provisions and exceptions listed above, the following additional Standing Orders shall be in effect for the 107th Congress: (1) If a committee has not reported out a legislative item or nomination because of a tie vote, then, after notice of such tie vote has been transmitted to the Senate by that committee and printed in the Record, the Majority Leader or the Minority Leader may, only after consultation with the Chairman and Ranking Member of the committee, make a motion to discharge such legislative item or nomination, and time for debate on such motion shall be limited to 4 hours, to be equally divided between the two Leaders, with no other motions, points of order, or amendments in order: Provided, That following the use or yielding back of time, a vote occur on the motion to discharge, without any intervening action, motion, or debate, and if agreed to it be placed immediately on the Calendar of Business (in the case of legislation) or the Executive Calendar (in the case of a nomination). (2) Notwithstanding the provisions of rule XXII, to insure that any cloture motion shall be offered for the purpose of bringing to a close debate, in no case shall it be in order for any cloture motion to be made on an amendable item during its first 12 hours of Senate debate: Provided, That all other provisions of rule XXII remain in status quo. (3) Both Leaders shall seek to attain an equal balance of the interests of the two parties when scheduling and debating legislative and executive business generally, and in keeping with the present Senate precedents, a motion to proceed to any Legislative or Executive Calendar item shall continue to be considered the prerogative of the Majority Leader, although the Senate Rules do not prohibit the right of the Democratic Leader, or any other Senator, to move to proceed to any item. <all>