Using conference committees may improve the legislative process

In the past, the California Legislature used conference committees as a part of the legislative process. However, despite extensive rules and procedures for their use that still exist today in the Joint Rules and the respective house rules, the conference committee in the California Legislature is largely nonexistent today.

Why is that? What did the conference committee used to do? Should they be used again in the legislative process?

First, what is a conference committee? According to the Office of Legislative Counsel, a conference committee is “a joint Assembly and Senate committee composed of six legislators, three from each House.” The purpose of a conference committee is “to reconcile differences between the Assembly and Senate versions of a measure.”

With a conference committee, the three Assembly conferees are chosen by the Speaker of the Assembly, while the three Senate conferees are chosen by the Senate President pro Tempore. The successful work product of a conference committee is the production of a “conference report,” which specifies the amendments that were agreed upon by a majority of the conferees.

In addition, a conference report requires at least two Members from each House to agree on the conference report in order for the report to be considered by the Assembly and Senate for a single floor vote of each house. Floor amendments are not able to be made to the conference report. And, there is no policy or fiscal committee hearing on the conference report because all of the requisite work is done by the conferees.

Interestingly, the use of conference committees in the U.S. Congress has also been reduced over the past decade. Until recently, when the House or the Senate passed a bill that was different than the other house’s version, they would go to conference committee to iron out differences and come up with a compromise bill to be voted up or down in each house.

At the federal level, observers have noted that legislative leaders have greater control to the changes being made to a bill, than if the bill were in a conference committee where conferees could include additional items that might create political issues for other legislators. On the other hand, some legislative observers view conference committees as being good mechanisms for achieving higher levels of compromise.

What causes a conference committee to be formed in the California Legislature? It is whenever the Senate or Assembly refuses to concur in the other house’s amendments, which is a rare occurrence today.

As explained by Joint Rule 28, which is titled “When Senate or Assembly Refuses to Concur,” in Subdivision (a): “If the Senate (if it is a Senate bill) or the Assembly (if it is an Assembly bill) refuses to concur in amendments to the bill made by the other house, and the other house has been notified of the refusal to concur, a conference committee shall be appointed for each house in the manner prescribed by these rules.”

This explanation leads us to the answer to the question posed at the outset: Conference committees are rarely used in the California Legislature today because the house of origin rarely “non-concurs” in the other house’s amendments. Why is that?

I think there are several reasons for this, such as the house of origin being consulted regarding the other house’s amendments and indicating well in advance if that bill, as amended by the other house, will not be well received when the bill returns to its house of origin. In addition, with the large number of majority party members in each house it is less likely that there will be significant disagreement with the substance of amendments made by the other house.

Moreover, in a legislative body that is controlled by more than two-thirds by one party, it is rare that the house of origin does not concur in the other house’s amendments. And, concurrence votes (as well as non-concurrence votes) usually occur in the last few days of the legislative session, which is when there is very little or no time at all for a conference committee to be appointed, convened, and concluded in its work before the final adjournment for the year.

Even the annual budget conference committee has effectively been eliminated in recent years, first due to the pandemic, and now due to the tight timeline between the May Budget Revision and the June 15 enactment date required of the state budget, coupled with the 72-hour in print rule.

As a result of these different factors, it has become rare for a conference committee to be convened in the California Legislature. Despite this fact, it is worth exploring whether conference committees would add value in the legislative process in order to fine-tune legislation and better achieve consensus on important public policy issues.