From the Congressional Glossary – Including Legislative and Budget Terms
Clean Bill
If a committee has approved extensive amendments, the committee may decide to report the original bill with one “amendment in the nature of a substitute” consisting of all the amendments previously adopted, or may introduce and report a new bill incorporating those amendments, commonly known as a “clean bill.”
Frequently after a committee has finished a major revision of a bill, one of the committee members, usually the chairman, will assemble the changes and what is left of the original bill into a new measure and introduce it as a “clean bill.” The revised measure, which is given a new number, then is referred back to the committee, which reports it to the floor for consideration. This often is a time-saver, as separate floor votes are avoided for committee-recommended changes in a clean bill. Reporting a clean bill also protects committee amendments that are subject to points of order concerning germaneness.
Also see Chapter 6, Legislating in Congress: Legislative Process, in Congressional Deskbook.
Star Trek:TOS: Clean bill of health from Dr. McCoy
More
- Chapter 3.G. Reporting Legislation to the Floor in Congressional Procedure
- Germane / Germaneness (CongressionalGlossary.com)
- “House Committee Markups: Manual of Procedures and Procedural Strategies,” CRS Report R41083 (220-page PDF
) - “The Committee Markup Process in the House of Representatives,” CRS Report RL30244 (29-page PDF)
- “Introduction to the Legislative Process in the U.S. Congress,” CRS Report R42843 (18-page PDF)
- “The Amending Process in the House of Representatives,” CRS Report 98-995 (49-page PDF)
- “Post-Employment, ‘Revolving Door,’ Laws for Federal Personnel,” CRS Report R42728 (20-page PDF)
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