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Sine Die
Rich Galen Wednesday December 08, 2004
BOREDOM ALERT: The following is a summary of everything you were supposed to have learned in high school civics but didn't because you were too busy ogling the girl (or boy) in the third row on whom you had a crush (and with whom you would still, to this very day, run away leaving your family to fend for themselves which, by the way, would be a good lesson for them and might cause them to appreciate all you do).
The US House of Representatives, last night, completed work on the intelligence reform legislation and has adjourned sine die. The US Senate is expected to follow suit today.
From Merriam-Webster's Second Edition: Sine Die: Without any future date being designated. This is called sine die because the 108th Congress will be finished, and so no future date for assembling is necessary.
The original language of the Constitution had the Congress meeting on the first Monday in December, but Amendment XX (which was ratified in 1933), Section 2 states, "The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such meeting shall begin at noon on the 3d day of January, unless they shall by law appoint a different day."
In the case of the 109th Congress the "different day" will be January 4, 2005. That happens to be the first Tuesday in January, which is fairly standard to allow for travel after the New Year.
All 435 Members of the House will be sworn in and many - especially the freshmen - bring their families and supporters, so the tradition has been that if January 3 falls on Saturday, Sunday, or Monday to move it to the next immediate Tuesday.
The Senate, by the way, is a "continuing body." Because only one-third of the Senate is up for election in any even-numbered year, only those who have been elected in the previous November's election must be sworn in. The other two-thirds continue in their six-year terms.
The President (and Vice President) will be sworn in at noon on January 20. In the olden days - prior to the 20th Amendment - the President was sworn in on March 4 in the year following his election. This was, in the days preceding airplanes, motorcades, and even trains, time to allow the President (and his principal ministers) to get to the capital city - which, in the beginning, was New York
Actually the 20th Amendment doesn't say that the President will be sworn in at noon. Section 1 states, "The terms of the President and the Vice-President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January�" and because we are not supposed to be without a sitting President and/or Vice President, the new executives are sworn in at the same moment the terms of the outgoing team end.
George Washington was inaugurated in New York City which was the US Capital from 1785-1790. He didn't get there until April 30th of that year, but as there was no one whose term was ending (the pesky Articles of Confederation not having worked out very well) the six week delay apparently didn't matter much to the new Republic.
Some time after a portion of Maryland (and briefly, Virginia) was chosen to be the permanent capital of the US, Charles Dickens visited and wrote, that it was composed of "spacious avenues that begin in nothing and lead nowhere; streets, [a]mile long, that only want houses, roads, and inhabitants; public buildings that need but a public."
This, of course, was before air conditioning.
For those who have never visited Your Nation's Capital and may be driving in for President Bush's Inaugural, I urge you heed this very good advice: Never take a diagonal street.
Thus endeth the lesson.
On the Secret Decoder Ring today: A link to the 20th Amendment, a Mullfoto with Judge Andrew Napolitano, and a link to an Iraq Flashback.
--END --
Copyright © 2004 Richard A. Galen
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