What do legislative terms like committee, floor and enrolled mean?

Legislatures use their own vocabulary, and each state has its own habits. These are the meanings as the words are used in Conservative States.

The legislature and its parts

• Legislature. The body that makes a state's laws, or the U.S. Congress for federal law. In the app, a legislature also means one regular session together with any special sessions held during it, and you look at one at a time.
• Chamber. One of the two houses of a legislature, usually a House (called the Assembly or House of Delegates in some states) and a Senate. Nebraska's legislature and the Council of the District of Columbia each have a single body.
• District. The area a legislator represents. Your districts come from your home address. Some districts elect more than one member, and some states label districts with letters or names rather than numbers.
• Committee. A small group of members of one chamber that studies bills on a subject, such as education or taxes, holds hearings, and votes on whether a bill moves forward. A subcommittee is a smaller group within a committee.
• Floor. The full chamber meeting together. A bill "on the floor" is ready for a vote by every member of that chamber.

Sessions

• Regular session. The legislature's scheduled meeting period, every year in most states and every other year in a few.
• Special session. An extra session, sometimes called an extraordinary session, called outside the regular session, usually for specific subjects.
• Prefiled bill. A bill filed before the session begins. When an upcoming session's bills start arriving, it becomes the legislature the app shows you.
• Adjourned. The session has ended. Bills that did not pass usually die when a legislature's term ends.

A bill's life

• Sponsor and cosponsor. The sponsor is the member who introduces a bill and carries it. Cosponsors add their names to show support.
• Companion bill. The same bill filed in both chambers at once. In some states, such as Tennessee, Wisconsin, Florida and Minnesota, the two move in parallel, and the app shows them together.
• Hearing. A committee meeting where a bill is discussed and often voted on. The public can usually attend or testify.
• Amendment. A proposed change to a bill. A committee or the full chamber votes on whether to adopt it. A substitute replaces a bill's text entirely.
• Fiscal note. An estimate, prepared by legislative staff, of what a bill would cost or save the state or local governments.
• Roll call vote. A recorded vote showing how each member voted.
• Engrossed. The version of a bill as it passed one chamber, with the adopted amendments written in.
• Enrolled. The final version passed by both chambers in identical form, sent to the governor (or, in Congress, the President).
• Veto. The governor's or President's rejection of a bill. The legislature can sometimes override a veto with a larger vote.
• Chaptered. The bill has become law and been given a chapter number in the state's session laws.

Words we use about bills

• Placeholder bill. A bill filed to hold a number or a subject, with little or no real content, meant to be filled in later by amendment. States call them caption bills, spot bills, vehicle bills or shell bills. We label them only in states where we can confirm them, and show when one has been rewritten.
• Stage. For letters, the bill's current step: its time in a particular committee, or on the floor of a chamber. You can write to each office once at each stage.
• Constituent. A person who lives in a legislator's district. Offices give the most weight to letters from their own constituents.

If this does not solve it, email support@conservativestates.app.