An Inclusive Litany

2/1/92

The biggest piece of federal legislation in 1986 was the tax reform bill. The biggest piece of legislation in 1987 was a bill correcting mistakes in the tax reform. The revised 1987 bill consisted of 1,489 pages, along with another 1,124 pages to explain how it worked. In addition, the Senate was required by its own rules to reprint the original bill as passed by the House of Representatives, with all the words they disagreed with crossed out. Since the Senate rewrote the bill from scratch, the result was that they printed 4,500 copies of a 452-page document in which every single word was crossed out. The document is available for $17, and it's called HR 3838 As Reported in the Senate, Part I. So far it has sold 1,800 copies.