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Comment by Gunax | Hacker News Reader

This is going to be controversial because it steps into the shutdown blame game.

I think I am more interested in the mechanics of how this happens. Why do we need to attach riders / sneak in legislation? What changes could we make to the constitution to avoid this?

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Single subject bill amendment. Several states require single subject bills in State legislature. The same must be required at the federal level. The pushback has always been "then nothing will get done". From where I am standing that would be a good thing. No more sneaking shit in at the last minute. Vote on every single issue. People will still try to sneak stuff in. I remember seeing a video of a Minnesota legislator admonishing his colleges for trying to do omnibus bills after they passed a single subject amendment.

To get such an amendment passed it would have to come from the States. Nobody that is already in congress is going to vote for this. It is a huge restriction on their power to spend our money.

Here is Alaska's single bill requirement: The Alaska Constitution Art II, Section 13. Form of Bills reads: Every bill shall be confined to one subject unless it is an appropriation bill or one codifying, revising, or rearranging existing laws. Bills for appropriations shall be confined to appropriations. The subject of each bill shall be expressed in the title. The enacting clause shall be: “Be it enacted by the Legislature of the State of Alaska.”

Hmm, I've never heard of this. My initial gut reaction is that this sounds good but the definition of 'single subject' is dubious. With enough leeway and creativity, anything can be a single subject.

But if it works, then maybe it's what we need.

Frankly, there are a ton of laws that seem dubious and underspecified to a person with an engineering mindset. This is by design, and it is the reason we have so many judges - because writing laws that clearly specify how they apply to every possible situation is often impossible. The law tries to make its intent clear, tries to lay out reasonably specific outlines, but necessarily must rely on the interpretation of those who judge the application of laws to cases.

Alaska is effectively a one-party state. At the federal level, you almost always need compromise to clear a filibuster, and it's easier to find compromise if you can draw on more subjects. Maybe the Democrats get cheaper health care while the Republicans get a giant bust of Trump installed on the former site of the Lincoln memorial. Neither measure would pass in isolation, but together they might.

So they could agree to pass two bills. This would require the two "sides" to trust each other, but it could (ideally would) also function to build trust, which would be a good thing.

Assuming there was enough trust to "guarantee" that one bill would pass right after the other, then what's the point of having the single subject rule in the first place? Sounds like you still have riders but with extra steps (and an opportunity to betray trust).

Because it becomes harder to "hide" things - like, the provisions being bargained for, or politicians' actual convictions about particular measures. There are items which now get passed in omnibus bills, bargained for behind closed doors by leadership, which couldn't (whip votes as ye may) be passed in up-or-down votes on their own merits. Those are, in my opinion, corrupt bargains, and shouldn't happen. I like legislative horse-trading - it's an important part of the democratic process - but I'd like it to be open and above board.

You say that like everybody that is in one party agrees on everything. That is absolutely false.

It is also an inaccurate portrayal of Alaska state politics. While historically the State Legislature has been majority republican it has been more even since 2015ish. Which is coincidentally when weed was made legal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_House_of_Representative...

How we vote in federal elections has more to do with Republicans in general being more aligned with the majority interests in Alaska.

Of course you don't have to agree on everything, but the whole point of joining a party is to coordinate action to maximize power. Whether you agree with the party policies doesn't matter if you vote for them anyway to gain political currency with your party that you can hopefully spend later on your own priorities.

That said, I guess the Alaska legislature is a lot more balanced than I assumed. If the single subject rule works there, bravo. Congress is a different beast, though.

The biggest benefit of single subject bills is that it is infinitely easier for citizens to understand what is being passed and hold legislators to account on the next election if necessary.

It makes things like the Patriot Act and Inflation Reduction Act impossible.

> Why do we need to attach riders / sneak in legislation?

Because they can't agree on anything normally, so the only way to make changes is to shove them in with things they must agree on.

> What changes could we make to the constitution to avoid this?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-subject_rule

Multiple states already have this.

This can have interesting consequences, because politicians are going to be politicians.

> The Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus sued, arguing that the omnibus bill, whose original title is over 300 words before it keels over in repetition of the word “subdivision,” violated the single-subject rule.

https://www.minnpost.com/state-government/2025/09/the-minnes...

Scoping the single subject gets a bit tough, in practice.

It works just fine for the vast majority of US states, including all the largest ones (California, New York, Texas). I don't think the federal government is special here.

The federal government has grown immensely since the early 20th century due to the interpretations of the commerce clause allowing more and more federal legislation and rules to broadly be applied to essentially override state legislation.

The 10th amendment exists for a reason. The system wasn't intended for congress to even control something like this in the first place.

We definitely are straining the rules. I think we actually want a federal government like this. The reality on the ground is that most people want things like FDA and FCC at the federal level.

Maybe we just need to change the constitution--which I know is technically possible but im practically it's frozen. It's like a legacy API no one wants to touch.

Playing devil's advocate, the positive of allowing legislation to include unrelated riders is that it promotes compromise. And compromise is how a healthy democracy should operate.

The compromise should be on the content of the bill specific to the subject. It is not a compromise to allow a rider that funnels money to some pet project. That is buying votes.

Oftentimes there can be no compromise on the specific subject. So the bill is either DOA or just immediately passed without any debate.

Allowing several issues to be passed as a singular unit provides opportunity for an agreement to be made about several issues at once. Think of it like a Collective Bargaining Agreement.

That is fine. If our representatives can't come to a compromise then it probably shouldn't be done at the federal level.

Yes, that's a really good point!

You don't need to have a bunch of unrelated riders to compromise. If the bill is healthcare funding, the compromise could be something like who receives the assistance, whether there are any cutoffs, how to implement it, etc.

Or if that's really impossible, you could compromise on separate bills. If people ever break promises, that's a reason not to trust them in the future and it's a lot more clear to the public about who voted which way rather than having a rider which no one really understands where it came from.

Compromise to what, to reopen the Government?

It's not the constitution. It's the American people (on average) who tolerate corruption and crime within their leaders.

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