That’s what happened yesterday in the Senate.
After getting through piles of procedural stuff, including confirming some trustees of a some state universities, the Rules chairman announced he had a calendar of about 50 local bills and if they were fortunate enough to make it through that, he had a second calendar prepared consisting of 10 bills leftover from the calendar they didn’t finish right before Spring Break. His announcement was followed by some complimentary remarks from the Republican caucus regarding the handling of the SO calendars, which I took to be a good sign.
Local bills are supposed to be given what is known as “local courtesy” and thus a 50 bill calendar should have been finished up with lightning speed. If you’re a Senator from Mobile, and a Senator from Huntsville brings a bill that only affects Huntsville residents, local courtesy dictates that you don’t interfere with the bill in any way, you just vote it through as quickly as possible.
Unfortunately, the Senate is not functioning very well right now. Of that 50 bill calendar, they made it through less than 10 before adjourning for the day.
So we’re back in the nerve-racking position of just waiting for the Senate to get back to working in a normal manner. We won’t come up for a vote until they do.
Things don’t look so hot for Thursday; I’ve heard they may try to bring up that AT&T deregulation bill that they dodged right before the break. But who really knows? Sigh.
