Lawmakers in Pierre this week are on deadline if they want certain legislation to survive. That’s because Tuesday is the last day committees can approve bills from their own chamber and send the measures to the full body. Committee members hear dozens of bills they don’t support. But some lawmakers may use a particular tool to force bills out of committee and to consideration on the House or Senate floor.
When paying attention to South Dakota lawmakers Tuesday, watch for smoke – as in, a smokeout. Jason Hancock is the director of the Legislative Research Council. He says the smokeout is what lawmakers call Joint Rule 7-7.
"Through a motion on the floor of the House or the floor of the Senate, you can require a committee to deliver out a bill to the floor that the committee has had. It would happen with a bill that the committee had voted to basically hold – to table or defer to the 41st day. They had essentially killed the bill," Hancock says.
A successful smokeout allows the full body to consider legislation, even if committee members don’t approve. To make it happen, one-third of lawmakers in the State Senate or House must support the move.
Before he came to South Dakota’s LRC last summer, Hancock worked with Idaho’s legislature for 20 years. He says he never saw the move to extract a bill from committee succeed both because it required a majority vote and because lawmakers deferred to committee action. Hancock says the smokeout is part of the process for South Dakota’s state legislature.
Because Tuesday is the last day for committees to send bills to the full chamber, it’s also the last day the body can use the smokeout to get legislation to the floor for a chance to pass out of its house of origin and survive crossover day. That is Wednesday.