Jim Maule, Villanova University School of Law:

"Well, the Congress has itself in a fine mess of hot water this time around. Readers of this blog know that I'm no fan of how Congress does business nor of most of what it generates.

According to reports proliferating throughout web and print press (CNN, New York Times, Tax Analysts, and Tax Guru, to name a few), the spending legislation that Congress passed on Saturday contains a provision that permits the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and the chair of the House Appropriations Committee and their assistants access to income tax returns unrestricted by privacy protection. Members of the Senate Finance and House Ways and Means Committees, which have primary responsibility for drafting tax legislation, have limited access to tax returns, so that they can evaluate IRS and other assertions that existing law is being abused or fails to accomplish legislative intent, but their access is subject to serious civil and criminal penalties if they disclose or misuse the information. The provision slipped into the spending bill lacks those restraints.

After people reading the text of the spending bill raised questions about the provision, spokespersons for House and Senate leaders said that the provision was a "mistake" and an "error." They promised to remove it, and the Senate quickly passed a resolution stating that the provision "shall have no effect." The House is scheduled to take up the resolution on Wednesday, and House leaders promise it will pass. Until it does, the spending bill will not be sent to the White House for the President's signature.

Congressional aides claim that the provision was inserted at the request of Representative Ernest Istook, Jr., who chairs the transportation subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee. Istook is no stranger to controversy, as this 1995 chronology of the "Istook Amendment" demonstrates. The bit about subcommittee staff admitted to the falsification of documents surely hasn't inspired me to rethink my disdain for how Congress operates.

The two chairs of the Appropriations Committees claim that they were unaware that the provision had been inserted into the legislation. Senator Kent Conrad of North Dakota fumed that the incident reflected a bigger problem, that is, the pattern of Congress having mere hours to review legislation that runs on for hundreds (or in this case, 3300) pages. (And people think I am wordy, ha ha). Yet Senator Stevens reacted negatively to Conrad's complaint, claiming that the incident was a unique event in his "more than 30 years" on the committee.

What's going on here? Is it just a matter of the typical chaos and confusion? I've been on the Hill while legislation was being drafted. It's only a tad less frenetic than the pit at a commodities exchange. It is easy to see how mistakes can be made. But even if this incident is simply a consequence of how Congress does business, it is a sharp reminder that, as Senator Conrad reminds us, Congress doesn't do a good job handing the way it does business. If a business did business the way Congress does business, the business would soon be out of business…. " [November 22, 2004; Mauled Again has more]