The following explains how federal laws typically are enacted in the U.S. Congress.
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Similar or identical versions of a bill that will create a new law—or amend or repeal an existing one—are introduced in the House of Representatives and the Senate. Sometimes they are introduced at or around the same time and progress in their respective chambers independently of each other. Other times, one chamber will kick off the process alone, passing a version of the bill it likes before sending it on to the other chamber for consideration. (The steps a bill must go through in each chamber are the same regardless of whether the other chamber is working on bill simultaneously.)
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The bills are prefixed according to chamber (House of Representatives or Senate) and numbered. Examples: H.R. 138, S. 21.
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The House and Senate each refer their bill to the appropriate committees and possibly to subcommittees for consideration.
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Subcommittees hold hearings, listen to testimony, debate the merits of the bill and usually amend (change) it. Once the subcommittees approve the bills it is reported to full committees.
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The full committees may hold additional hearings, engage in further debate and often adopt more amendments before voting on passage.
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Once successfully through the committee process, the bill is voted on by the full legislative body (House or Senate) in what is called a “floor vote.”
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There often are differences in the final versions of a bill by the time it has passed both chambers. At this stage, a committee made up of both House and Senate members, called a conference committee, meets to iron out these differences and create one unified bill. If that compromise bill is approved by a majority vote in each chamber, it is sent to the President of the United States for his or her signature.
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The president signs the bill, which makes it law, or vetoes it.
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If the president vetoes the bill, it can still become law if two-thirds of the members of both the House and the Senate vote to override the veto.
A similar law-creation process generally occurs at the state level—but to find out exactly how it works in your state, visit your state legislature’s official website. Most of them include explanations of the law-making process.