A Modest Proposal for Congress

I have a modest and very responsible proposal for Congress. It is also very simple.

No Representative of the House and no Senator shall be allowed to vote in favor of a new law unless he signs a sworn affidavit that he has read the bill completely.

He may vote against a bill without such an affidavit, since it is reasonable not to pass a bill whose supporters say it will do something which the legislator thinks is wrong or since he may have read a portion of the bill which is so wrong that it is clear the bill should not be passed into law.

Of course, I would ideally like to require that he also make a clear statement for the record as to what power granted to the Congress allows Congress to make such law. He should be required to show that the law is not unconstitutional as well. If he claims the law is in the interest of the General Welfare, then he should also have to show what listed power of Congress allows him to act in the General Welfare by passing the law.

Now I understand that in the present climate of political unthought, it will be very unlikely that Congressmen will limit their laws to the scope of their actual Constitutional powers. But, it would be something if we could at least get them to swear that they read it. Then, at least they would not defend themselves as not responsible for some of the great foolhardiness in many of their laws by saying that they did not know what the law was doing because they did not read it.

Proposed laws should also be posted on the Internet for a week before they are voted on in Congress so the public can review them for Constitutionality, graft, and general stupidity.