In
legislative
A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make laws for a political entity such as a country or city. They are often contrasted with the executive and judicial powers of government.
Laws enacted by legislatures are usually known ...
debate, a wrecking amendment (also called a poison pill amendment or killer amendment) is an
amendment An amendment is a formal or official change made to a law, contract, constitution, or other legal document. It is based on the verb to amend, which means to change for better. Amendments can add, remove, or update parts of these agreements. The ...
made by a
legislator
A legislator (also known as a deputy or lawmaker) is a person who writes and passes laws, especially someone who is a member of a legislature. Legislators are often elected by the people of the state. Legislatures may be supra-national (for ex ...
who disagrees with the principles of a
bill and who seeks to make it useless (by moving amendments to either make the bill malformed and nonsensical, or to severely change its intent) rather than directly opposing the bill by simply voting against it.
In the United Kingdom, a wrecking amendment can take the form of the words "this House declines to give the Bill a Second Reading" inserted into the text. If such an amendment passes, the bill is not reviewed any further and is removed from the list of bills in progress.
An important character of wrecking amendments is that they are not moved in
good faith, that is, the proposer of the amendment would not see the amended legislation as good legislation and would still not vote in favour of the legislation when it came to the final vote if the amendment were accepted. Motives for making them include allowing more debate, delaying the enactment of the legislation, or just sometimes a straightforward attempt to make the initiator of the legislation give up.
Some opponents of particular amendments will describe them as wrecking amendments because they regard the amendments as undermining the unity of the original proposal. Proponents of the amendment may seek to deny the charge by saying that the original proposal brings together different steps, and while personally they oppose all the parts, some parts are even worse than others and legislators should have an opportunity to consider them separately.
Wrecking amendments can pick up more votes than motions against, because observers tend to focus on who voted in favour and against the Bill in the final count, rather than looking at the amendments made during the passage through the legislature.
The US
Civil Rights Act of 1964 was amended at the last minute by Rep.
Howard W. Smith of Virginia to add "sex" as a protected class. This was regarded as a wrecking amendment by those who thought that labor unions would oppose that aspect. The author of the bill claimed otherwise and it passed with the amendment intact.
Examples
*The
Wyoming House of Representatives
The Wyoming House of Representatives is the lower house of the Wyoming State Legislature. There are 60 Representatives in the House, representing an equal number of single-member constituent districts across the state, each with a population of ...
Committee of the Whole amended House Bill 0085 in order to kill the bill. The amendment would have required the state to consider purchasing an aircraft carrier (even though
Wyoming
Wyoming () is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the southwest, and Colorado to the s ...
is a landlocked state), purchasing
fighter jet
Fighter aircraft are fixed-wing military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat. In military conflict, the role of fighter aircraft is to establish air superiority of the battlespace. Domination of the airspace above a battlefield ...
s, establishing a
military
A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. It is typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with its members identifiable by their distinct ...
, initiating a
draft
Draft, The Draft, or Draught may refer to:
Watercraft dimensions
* Draft (hull), the distance from waterline to keel of a vessel
* Draft (sail), degree of curvature in a sail
* Air draft, distance from waterline to the highest point on a vesse ...
, and creating a
currency
A currency, "in circulation", from la, currens, -entis, literally meaning "running" or "traversing" is a standardization of money in any form, in use or circulation as a medium of exchange, for example banknotes and coins.
A more general ...
. Also, the creation of a currency would violate the
United States Constitution.
See also
*
Christmas tree bill
In the United States Congress, a Christmas tree bill is a political term referring to a bill that attracts many, often unrelated, floor amendments. A Christmas tree bill consists of many riders. The amendments which adorn the bill may provide spe ...
*
Omnibus bill
An omnibus bill is a proposed law that covers a number of diverse or unrelated topics. ''Omnibus'' is derived from Latin and means "to, for, by, with or from everything". An omnibus bill is a single document that is accepted in a single vote by a ...
*
Poison pill
*
Probing amendment
*
Rider (legislation)
In legislative procedure, a rider is an additional provision added to a bill or other measure under the consideration by a legislature, having little connection with the subject matter of the bill.
Some scholars identify riders as a specific form ...
References
{{Poli-term-stub
Political terminology