{"id":83,"date":"2020-01-28T15:58:33","date_gmt":"2020-01-28T15:58:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/restorejusticeillinois.org\/2020\/01\/28\/how-a-bill-becomes-a-law-in-illinois\/"},"modified":"2023-06-22T00:27:40","modified_gmt":"2023-06-22T00:27:40","slug":"how-a-bill-becomes-a-law-in-illinois","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/restorejusticeillinois.org\/how-a-bill-becomes-a-law-in-illinois\/","title":{"rendered":"How a Bill Becomes a Law in Illinois"},"content":{"rendered":"<section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-heading mt-10 lg:mt-15 -mb-3\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Forgot your 5th Grade Civics lessons? We&#8217;ve got you covered.<\/strong> <\/h5>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p>In Illinois, a policy idea becomes a bill (a formal legislative proposal), after it has been&nbsp;officially filed by a legislative sponsor and assigned a bill number for that session. That does not guarantee it will pass, or even get a thorough review. The sponsor must shepherd the bill through a six-month session, navigating deadlines, opposition, and the competing priorities. Every idea aspiring to become a law in Illinois has to go through at least SIX and sometimes SEVEN hurdles:&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-list my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><p>A <strong><em>legislator <\/em><\/strong>has to agree to sponsor the bill AND has to ensure all deadlines are met, and that the bill does not get \u201clost in the pile.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/li>\n\n<li><p>The bill has to pass a substantive committee in the House (sponsor may amend it to get enough support to get out of committee).<\/p>\n<\/li>\n\n<li><p>It has to pass a substantive committee in the Senate (sponsor may amend, or change, the bill to get enough support to get out of committee).<\/p>\n<\/li>\n\n<li><p>It has to get <strong><em>60 or more<\/em> of 118 votes<\/strong> in the House (sponsor may amend it to get to 60 votes).<\/p>\n<\/li>\n\n<li><p>It has to get <strong><em>30 or more<\/em> of 59 <\/strong>votes in the Senate (sponsor may amend it to get to 30 votes).<\/p>\n<\/li>\n\n<li><p>(It may have to have a \u201cconcurrence\u201d vote if any amendments were made after a vote in another chamber.)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n\n<li><p>It has to be signed by the Governor.<\/p>\n<\/li><\/ul>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p>It is <strong>extremely rare<\/strong> for a bill that has opposition to pass without amendments. A good sponsor will work with opponents, supporters, and stakeholders to make smart amendments that strike the best middle ground.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-image my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/restorejusticeillinois.org\/app\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/03\/Copy-of-Bill-Introduced-by-Sponsor-1-1024x614.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-18405\"\/><\/figure>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p>A bill that does not get through these six-seven steps over the course of a session (from January through May each year) is considered finished for the year and will have to begin again. Once a bill has failed to get out of committee, it is finished for the year.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p>REMEMBER: A bill is just an idea! If it starts with \u201cHB\u201d or \u201cSB\u201d (or \u201cHR\u201d or \u201cSR\u201d) it is NOT YET A LAW. Laws begin with \u201cPA.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p><strong>But what happens to bills that don\u2019t make it? Can they come back? What happens to the bill numbers?<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p>Think of any possible new law as an idea. It is just an idea, nothing more, until it gets filed and is assigned a bill number. Then it is a bill, an idea formally being considered by the legislature.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p>The legislature operates within two-year cycles, and each cycle is numbered. For example, we are now in the second year of the 101st General Assembly, meaning the legislature is assembled for the 101st two-year period in the history of our state. HB 531, the Youthful Parole Bill (signed into law in 2019), was passed on one of the final days of the 100th General Assembly, at the end of a two-year cycle.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p>Bill numbers are only \u201cgood\u201d during the two-year period in which they were introduced.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p><strong>For example,<\/strong> let\u2019s pretend we want to file a bill to say the state must provide ice cream for every five-year-old on their birthday. We find a sponsor and they file it now, in the first year of the 101st General Assembly, 2019, and it is given the number HB 001. We work very hard, but the Cookie Manufacturer\u2019s Association hates the HB 001 because they think the Ice Cream Manufacturers are going to get rich while cookies become unpopular. They fight HB 001, and for two years, 2019 and 2020, the bill fails. In 2021 the 102nd General Assembly begins, and we want to keep working on our ice cream birthday proposal, but now we can\u2019t use the number HB 001. We have to start over with a new bill number because we have jumped over into a new General Assembly. Let\u2019s imagine the only bill number available is HB 022. So now we can take the exact words from HB 001 but we need to file them with a new number, and someone else will get HB001.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><section class=\"px-mobile xl:px-desktop wp-core-paragraph my-6 first:mt-12 first:lg:mt-25 last:lg:mb-25\"><div class=\"mx-auto max-w-200 text-black-brand\/80\">\n<p>This may explain why, when you look up a bill by the number, you find something totally unrelated. This may be because you have an old bill number to look up, and the proposal you care about may have a new one.<br><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Forgot your 5th Grade Civics lessons? We&#8217;ve got you covered. In Illinois, a policy idea becomes a bill (a formal legislative proposal), after it has been&nbsp;officially filed by a legislative sponsor and assigned a bill number for that session. That does not guarantee it will pass, or even get a thorough review. The sponsor must &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/restorejusticeillinois.org\/how-a-bill-becomes-a-law-in-illinois\/\">Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[13,14],"custom-author":[],"class_list":["post-83","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-legislative-process","tag-civics","tag-how-it-works"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How a Bill Becomes a Law in Illinois - Restore Justice Illinois<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/restorejusticeillinois.org\/how-a-bill-becomes-a-law-in-illinois\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How a Bill Becomes a Law in Illinois - Restore Justice Illinois\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Forgot your 5th Grade Civics lessons? 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