1986 FOPA Hughes Amendment Vote (machine gun ban) footage located

[YosemiteSam]

The first recorded vote was not on the Hughes amendment. It was on the motion for the committee of the whole to rise. Try learning Roberts rules of order and the House rules at the time. It was to try and change the House rule set up for the debate of the underlying legislation and bring more anti amendments to the floor.That motion was voted down by the first recorded vote.
No one stood to request a recorded vote after the voice vote on the Hughes amendment.

[MrBi11]

watch it again 6:00-6:49 is the rise to vote.

Motions are commonly decided by voice vote (or viva voce in Robert's Rules). But the presiding officer may, on his own initiative, call for a rising vote, a counted vote, or even a ballot vote. Additionally, before the voting actually begins, any member may offer an incidental motion to conduct the vote using a different method.

[Mr_Gixxer]

***grabs some popcorn and hits the subscribe button on this thread***

[legendarylorot]

Any updates here?

It's my general understanding from everything here that the bill did not pass committee, and therefore its passing the full legislature is null. However, there is some question as to whether this actually matters or not, since the full legislature might just use a "it's in front of us now" approach. Is this second scenario, in fact, accurate, or does it just apply to the contents of the bill rather than whether or not the bill should even be there.

If this is found to be not true, and in fact should not have been in front of the legislature at large, is this act nullified, or does its signature into law transcend the legality of the legislative procedures?

***grabs some popcorn and hits the subscribe button on this thread***

Should we e-mail this whole mess to Colbert and see what he says? It would make great TV.

[utimmer43]

The means by which a bill is composed (including adding amendments to it) is not defined by the Constitution. Rather, the House leadership makes and enforces their own rules. Even if the house rules were violated, the amendment was included in the final bill. This is where the Constitution comes in and says that a bill must pass both houses of Congress and be signed by the President to become law. At this point, anyone opposing the amendment could have voted against the entire bill, or it could have been vetoed. None of that happened, and so it is the law.

That's the way I understand it anyway. I'd love it if I was incorrect here, but I don't think that's the case.

[PaGunner]

The means by which a bill is composed (including adding amendments to it) is not defined by the Constitution. Rather, the House leadership makes and enforces their own rules. Even if the house rules were violated, the amendment was included in the final bill. This is where the Constitution comes in and says that a bill must pass both houses of Congress and be signed by the President to become law. At this point, anyone opposing the amendment could have voted against the entire bill, or it could have been vetoed. None of that happened, and so it is the law.

That's the way I understand it anyway. I'd love it if I was incorrect here, but I don't think that's the case.

Sadly you are correct. I still can't believe the NRA was asked by Reagan if they wanted it vetoed and they said no. Anyway the 2 ways I see this being overturned are through the Supreme Court or through the House. The bill may pass the House of Reps. but will most likely be denied by Senate and if it did pass no way we could get the 2/3s majority to override Obama's veto. So I would say our best shot would be 2012 here. Though the Supreme Court seems like a viable option now since there seems to be a 5-4 Conservative majority which we may not see again for a while if one of the 5 retires or dies and Obama appoints a Liberal.

If we could get to the SCOTUS and have them declare such Laws as unconstitutional it would be a major victory for us. Rarely does the SCOTUS overrule precedent. This would give us a major advantage against any similiar acts passed in the future.

[LifeInPa]

Lets be perfectly honest here, what are the chances of this BS law being repelled between now and the end of time? As much as I want it to happen I just don't see it happening.

[GregorOneEye]

So what is the proper process and what did they do wrong? I can't get videos working recently.

[legendarylorot]

The proper process is that a bill gets voted out of committee before it goes to the main legislature, and then gets voted on there. From there it moves to the other half of the legislature for confirmation, and then goes to be signed.

If a bill fails any of these votes, it dies.

The partial transcript of the video, quoted in the original post, makes it clear that although the vote tally clearly shows the bill did not pass committee, the committee chairman said it did anyway. After Hughes tried to keep it from being read aloud 4 times so that time for discussion would run out before everyone knew the contents of what they were voting on.

[BandanaBandit1]

This is very interesting, Please keep us updated! we would love to hear more!