How Does a Bill Become a Law?

Content approved by Jerry Parker

The people who make up the United States Congress have the job of creating laws. Every law in the United States begins as a bill. The bill must be approved by the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the president before it becomes a law.

This is called the legislative process. Knowing the journey a bill takes on its way to becoming a law can help you understand more about where America’s laws came from and how we can make new ones.

Step 1: Turning an Idea Into a Bill

Someone has to come up with an idea for the law, and that someone can be anybody, even a kid! When someone has an idea for a new law, the next step is to contact one of their representatives in Congress to talk to them about it. If the representative likes the idea, they can start the legal process of making it into a law. They’ll do some research on the idea, and then they’ll write up a proposed law, called a bill. Next, they’ll talk to their fellow representatives to find other people willing to sponsor the bill, meaning that they will support it and help to introduce it in either the House or Senate.

Step 2: Introducing the Bill

Now, the representative will introduce the bill. In the House of Representatives, bills are introduced by placing them into a box on the House clerk’s desk. The clerk will then assign a number to the bill that starts with the letters “H.R.” A reading clerk will then read the bill to all of the representatives. The House speaker, the person in charge of the House, then sends the bill to a House committee.

Bills can be introduced by senators, too, and the process works the same way in the Senate. Bill numbers in the Senate start with “S.” instead of “H.R.”

Step 3: Committee

Once a bill is given to a committee, the members of the committee review, research, and revise the bill. After this, the members will vote to decide whether to send the bill back to the House or Senate floor. They might also decide to send the bill to a subcommittee to do more research. Once a bill gets the committee’s approval and goes to the floor, all of the lawmakers can debate it.

Step 4: On the Floor

Once a bill reaches the floor, all of the representatives will discuss it and explain why they agree or disagree with it. Debate can take a long time or a short time. After the debate is finished, a clerk reads each section of the bill, and the representatives make changes to it as the bill is read. Once the changes are done, the bill is ready for a vote.

Step 5: Voting

Voting can happen in one of three ways:

• In a voice vote, the House speaker or presiding officer of the Senate will ask those who support the bill to say “aye,” then ask those who don’t support it to say “no.”
• A division vote works almost the same way, but each group is asked to stand up so they can be counted instead of being asked to say something.
• Lawmakers can also take a recorded vote, meaning that each person has to cast an individual vote that’s recorded with their name so people can see how they voted. In the House, there’s an electronic voting system representatives can use. In the Senate, they do this by a roll call: Each senator’s name is called, one at a time, and each responds by saying their vote.

Step 6: Do it Again

If the bill is approved, it’s sent to the other house of Congress, where the process starts all over again: The bill is sent to a committee, discussed, approved, sent to the floor, debated, and voted on. Both the House and the Senate have to vote to approve a bill before it can become a law. Then, it can be sent to the president.

Step 7: The President’s Turn

The president can do one of three things when a bill is sent to them:

• If the president likes the bill, they will sign it and it will become a law.
• If the president doesn’t like the bill, they can veto it instead of signing it. When that happens, the bill is sent back to Congress, where both chambers can vote on it again. If two thirds of the people in both the House and the Senate vote for the bill, the bill becomes a law.
• The president can also choose to do nothing, which is called a pocket veto. When this happens, if Congress is in session at the time, the bill will become a law after ten days. If Congress isn’t in session, the bill doesn’t become a law.

Interesting Facts

• When bills go through the committees in the House and Senate, committee members often attach amendments to the bill. These amendments can change the bill so that sometimes, the bill approved by the House is different from the bill approved by the Senate. If this happens, a special conference committee has to work on the bill to resolve the differences between the two versions. Then, the new bill has to be voted on again.
• A lot of times, a committee will get a bill and choose to not do anything with it. If the committee does nothing, the bill is said to have died in committee.
• Representatives and senators are not required to vote on bills, even if they’re present during a vote.
• Only about 5% of bills will end up becoming laws.

Additional Resources

• The Legislative Process
• How a Bill Becomes a Law
• Government 101: How Laws Are Made
• From Bill to Law: A Step-By-Step Guide
• How a Bill Becomes a Law
• How Laws Are Created
• Schoolhouse Rock: “I’m Just a Bill”
• How Bills Become Laws
• How State Laws Are Created
• The Legislative Process: Overview
• How Does the Federal Legislative Process Work?
• How a Bill Becomes a Law
• Making Laws
• How a Bill Becomes a Law: The Legislative Process
• Constitutional Topic: How a Bill Becomes a Law
• How Are New Laws Made?
• The Process of Making a Law
• Tracking a Bill From Beginning to End
• How a Bill Becomes a Law

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