Pros And Disadvantages Of A Full-Time Or Part Time Legislature

There are many reforms that have been discussed one being to extend the term for members of the Texas Legislature. Many feel that if the Senate is extended to six years and the House of Representative to four years it will allow the members to obtain more experience in fields and be able to not have to worry about when the next election is as often. Many critics feel that the time members are in session are too short to make any real progress, reformers would like to increase the length of legislative sessions from the current 140 days. Others feel that increasing the sessions would allow for more laws and regulations. This will be an ongoing debate where there will always be two sides to the possibility of reform which will impact the possibility of it being passed.

The Texas legislature, as stated by Champagne, Harpham, & Casellas, is a bicameral legislature compromised of two chambers. That is, the Senate and the Texas House of Representatives (2017, p. 211). It includes 31 senators and 150 House members. The legislature serves as the most critical establishment that aids in representing the state (Champagne et al., 2017, p.211). Members of the Texas state legislature must meet the essential requirements, perform their duties to the best of their ability, represent citizens, and attend sessions.

The Texas Legislature should continue to serve as part-time lawmaking bodies. This has been this way for over 137 years, and has become tradition. There are several reasons why it is a better idea to keep the part-time lawmaking. People fear that if they start meeting in regular session each year it would cause increased governmental power and spending. (Texas Politics- Newell, Prindle, Riddlesperger, Dovovan, Smith, Mooney) If the government met more often the people would think that they would make more rules and have more

There are many different opinions on how much power the governor of Texas should have than other states. Some people debate on whether Texas government should have a singular executive instead of plural executive. There are pros and cons of having a plural executive model and at times they believe that it can be more democratic than the single executive model. The governor’s power is debated about whether or not they have not enough or too much power with governing the state of Texas.

The two-year congressional term has both advantages and disadvantages. At two years, the congressional term is the shortest governmental term. This helps limit corruption in congress, with the power that comes with being a member of congress, a term of only two years it allows only a short exposure to power which prevents long term corruption in the government. On the other hand, those who have worked in a field longer allows them to be more experienced in their job and they can do a better job, so keeping the term limit to two years limits the chances of someone gaining more experience in their position and becoming better at it. With the frequent change in congressman it allows new people to come in and brings a fresh flow of ideas and prevents

Let’s start by going through the basics of the procedure. The state government is made up of three branches. (The “Executive”, headed by the governor, the “Judicial”, consisting of Texas supreme the court along with state courts, and the “Legislative”, which includes 150 members in the House of Representatives and 31 in the state senate) Of these three, the Legislative branch is responsible for creating laws such as “S.B. 11”. The speaker of the House and Lieutenant Governor of the Senate both discuss rules that must be followed during the discussion of the bill. A Representative or Senator gets the idea for a new law by listening to the people that they represent. Once heard, a “Bill” is written. Many of the new bills are presented in the chamber, in which they arose from, in the “First Reading”. In the House, they are considered by each committee in three different meeting settings. After consideration, a committee may take no action or issue a report on it. In the Senate, testimony may be heard.

In contrast, the Texas State Senate has its focus on the Upper House of the Texas State Legislature. The Senate consists of 31 members, who represent single-member districts settled in Texas. The latest studies confirm that each individual district has an average of 806.000 civilians. Each term a member serves last for four years. Similarly, to the House, the senate has no term limits. The person who leads the Senate is the Lieutenant Governor of Texas. The Lieutenant Governor is considered to many to be more influential. In 2013, the 83rd Legislative Session occurred and six new senators were added to the

How can the legislators do their job, if the government is giving them limitations? In article 3 section 24 of the Texas Constitution it states “members of the legislature shall receive from the public Treasury a salary of $600 per month” (Texas Constitution, 1876). Legislators are here to discuss and approve laws. They should have the power and abilities to request an increase in their own salaries. There are three reasons why I believe that legislators should get an increase in salary. First reason, demanding lawmakers to work longer hours. Second reason, spending less time at home away from family and friends. Lastly, putting career goals on hold. Legislators are making sacrifices every day to best serve the people and they should in return

The limitations on and difficulties of passing laws are very, very important. The split legislature creates a more complicated maze through which laws must find their way before being passed. First, a law must be introduced in either the House of Representatives or the Senate, the former having sole power to introduce laws concerning revenue. After the law is introduced, it must be approved by the other house, who may agree with, amend, or discard the law. Once

Divided government describes a government where one party is in control of the executive branch while another party has control over the Senate and/or the House of Representatives (the two houses of the legislative branch, or Cogress). The presence of divided government effects the speed at which laws are passed. Research shows that a divided government decreases the production of laws by almost 30 percent. Research also shows that there is a 60-day time difference between the time it takes unified governments and divided governments to pass important bills (the maximum taking a divided government has been two years); two months is a pretty good amount of time when talking about a two-year congressional term. A divided

Within the Parliament, there are different branches of government that are working with the President and Prime Minister. The Legislative Branch is one of the many that are in charge of examining bills, creating laws, and pass or reject laws before they are reviewed by the government. The branch has a total of “300 deputies elected through direct, universal, and secret ballot and they are also in office for four years except in time of war, when it is extended for the duration”. (Photius) The assembly meets five months out of the year beginning in October. In the assembly, there are committees formed to examine bills. The committee membership is usually proportional to party representation in the chambers. When sessions have started, the law-making

1. Balancing power: Constitutionally, legislatures are separate, co-equal branches (indeed, the legislature is the first branch of government and the executive the second) that share governmental power. Balancing powers between legislatures is challenge. A good legislatures must insist on participating in the initiation of policy and refuse to rubber-stamp executive proposals.

For instance, the State Legislature of Texas, as a hybrid legislature, has proved both annual and biennial sessions and budgets, but even then, it has been a challenge to achieve a great rate of passing bills. Even when the Governor of Texas has the power to summon a special session; like 16 other states, the rate of passing bills has been decreasing lower than 25% from the total of bills proposed (Zelinski, 2017). Furthermore, the session length is the factor that engulfs the management of time over legislatorial sessions. This control opens a possible influence over the political agenda of the party in control over the legislature, where there is a potential advantage taken by the governors, thus impacting state business and affairs. To illustrate this, the usual time of session for the North Dakota legislature is sixty-six days over a two-year period, there would be a 0.78% increase in the state's budget by the propositions of the governor (Kousser and Philips, 2009). In addition, the variation on the amount of compensation for legislators has become a key factor over the professionalization level throughout the states. For example, a lawmaker in Illinois would receive a base salary of $67,836 per year and a per diem rate, per each day of session, of $111. On the other hand, a state lawmaker in Idaho is going to receive $16,438 as a base salary and a per diem rate ranging from $25 to $122 (NCSL, 2014 State Legislator Compensation). Therefore, it is common to see that states where their legislators are being paid higher salaries, such as in California, Pennsylvania or Illinois, are being ranked at a higher level of professionalization, rather than part-time legislature states, like New Hampshire or Utah. As a factor of

In the last decades, several bicameral States in Europe revised or started to question the functioning or the structure of their second chamber. In many cases, reforms of bicameralism affected both the form of State –i.e. the way the political power is located over the territory– and the form of government –i.e. the relationships between the legislative and the executive powers. Eventually, this reform process transformed the constitutional equilibriums of the EU, deepening its constitutional and political crisis –since in the absence of a formal European Constitution the constitutional essence of the EU legal system is nothing but the intersection of the constitutional frameworks of its Members .

The purposes of state legislatures are the same throughout the United States. The roles of legislatures are to pass laws, create polices, represent the citizens within their districts, and oversee the governor, executive branch, and some private businesses. However, the topics