AMENDMENTS BETWEEN THE HOUSES.
When either House, _e. g._ the House of Commons, sends a bill to the
other, the other may pass it with amendments. The regular progression
in this case is, that the Commons disagree to the amendment; the Lords
insist on it; the Commons insist on their disagreement; the Lords adhere
to their amendment; the Commons adhere to their disagreement. The term of
insisting may be repeated as often as they choose, to keep the question
open. But the first adherence by either renders it necessary for the
other side to recede or adhere also; when the matter is usually suffered
to fall.--10 _Grey_, 148. Latterly, however, there are instances of their
having gone to a second adherence. There must be an absolute conclusion
of the subject somewhere, or otherwise transactions between the Houses
would be endless.--3 _Hats._ 268, 270. The term of insisting, we are told
by Sir John Trevor, was then [1679] newly introduced into Parliamentary
usage, by the Lords.--7 _Grey_, 94. It was certainly a happy innovation,
as it multiplies the opportunities of trying modifications which may bring
the House to a concurrence. Either House, however, is free to pass over
the term of insisting, and to adhere in the first instance--10 _Grey_,
146. But it is not respectful to the other. In the ordinary Parliamentary
course, there are two free conferences at least before adherence.--10
_Grey_, 147.
Either House may recede from its amendment, and agree to the bill;
or recede from their disagreement to the amendment, and agree to the
same absolutely, or with an amendment. For here the disagreement and
receding destroy one another, and the subject stands as before the
disagreement.--_Elsynge_, 23, 27; 9 _Grey_, 476.
But the House cannot recede from or insist on, its own amendment with
an amendment, for the same reason that it cannot send to the other
House an amendment to its own act after it has passed the act. They may
modify an amendment from the other House by ingrafting an amendment on
it, because they have never assented to it; but they cannot amend their
own amendment, because they have, on the question, passed it in that
form; 9 _Grey_, 353; 10 _Grey_, 240. In Senate, March 29, 1798. Nor
where one House has adhered to their amendment, and the other agrees
with an amendment, can the first House depart from the form which they
have fixed by an adherence.
In the case of a money bill, the Lords' proposed amendments became,
by delay, confessedly necessary. The Commons, however, refused them,
as infringing on their privilege as to money bills, but they offered
themselves to add to the bill a proviso to the same effect, which had
no coherence with the Lords' amendments, and urged, that it was an
expedient warranted by precedent, and not unparliamentary in a case
become impracticable, and irremediable in any other way.--3 _Hats._ 256,
266, 270, 271. But the Lords refused and the bill was lost, 1 _Chand._
288. A like case, 1 _Chand._ 311. So the Commons resolve, that it is
unparliamentary to strike out at a conference anything in a bill which
hath been agreed and passed by both Houses, 6 _Grey_, 274; 1 _Chand._ 312.
A motion to amend an amendment from the other House, takes precedence
of a motion to agree or disagree.
A bill originating in one House, is passed by the other with an amendment.
The originating House agrees to their amendment with an amendment. The
other may agree to their amendment with an amendment; that being only
in the second and not the third degree. For, as to the amending House,
the first amendment with which they passed the bill is a part of its
text; it is the only text they have agreed to. The amendment to that
text by the originating House, therefore, is only in the 1st degree, and
the amendment to that again by the amending House is only in the 2d, to
wit, an amendment to an amendment, and so admissible. Just so when, on a
bill from the originating House, the other, at its 2d reading, makes an
amendment; on the 3d reading, this amendment is become the text of the
bill, and if an amendment to it be moved, an amendment to that amendment
may also be moved, as being only in the second degree.