Bill Lee: “shortly the Senate will vote on the motion to appoint conferees--or what is often called the motion to go to…”

“shortly the Senate will vote on the motion to appoint conferees--or what is often called the motion to go to conference--for a bill that reauthorizes the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the ESEA, which is the legislation governing our Federal K-12 education policy. Because most Americans have probably never heard of this obscure parliamentary procedure--the motion to appoint conferees, that is--I wish to take just a moment to explain how it works or at least how it should work. When the House and the Senate each pass separate but similar bills, the two Chambers have the ability to convene what is called a conference, a conference committee. A conference is essentially a meeting where delegates from each Chamber come together to iron out any differences between their respective--similar but somewhat different-- bills and then put together what is called a conference report, which is a single piece of legislation that reconciles any disparities between the House-passed bill and the Senate-passed counterpart to that bill. Once the delegates to the conference--the conferees, as they are sometimes known--agree on a conference report, they bring it back to their respective Chambers, to the House and the Senate, for a final vote. It is important to note that once the conference report is sent to the House and the Senate for a final vote, there is no opportunity to amend the legislation. It is an up-or-down vote.…”