This was the week of the “strike-all amendment,” a legislative mechanism where one chamber (House or Senate) makes a wholesale change (amendment) to a bill that arrived from the opposite chamber. We simply erase (strike it all) the language in the bill that just arrived and insert the House’s own wording in the form of an amendment, thus the name “strike all amendment.”
Many of the general bills that the House of Representatives considered this week were in the form of a strike-all amendment. Generally, the bills are of similar nature and effect. The aim is to get either the House or Senate version into what is known as “conference,” or extended discussion between three House members and three senators. They emerge with one final bill to be voted on by both full chambers before the session ends on April 2.

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