Bill Text: TX HB74 | 2017-2018 | 85th Legislature | Introduced

---

Bill Title: Relating to the Texas Balance of Powers Act.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Republican 1-0)

Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2017-02-14 - Referred to State & Federal Power & Responsibility, Select [HB74 Detail]

Download: Texas-2017-HB74-Introduced.html

---

85R968 TJB-F
By: Flynn H.B. No. 74

A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT
relating to the Texas Balance of Powers Act.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
SECTION 1. (a) This Act shall be known as the Texas Balance
of Powers Act.
(b) The legislature finds that:
(1) The people of the several states comprising the
United States of America created the federal government to be their
agent for certain enumerated purposes and nothing more.
(2) The Tenth Amendment to the United States
Constitution defines the total scope of federal power as including
only those powers specifically delegated by the Constitution to the
federal government. Those powers not explicitly delegated by the
Constitution to the federal government are reserved to the states
or to the people themselves.
(3) Each power delegated to the federal government by
the United States Constitution encompasses only that power as it
was understood at the time it was delegated, subject only to an
expansion or limitation of that power by a subsequent amendment to
the Constitution.
(4) The United States Constitution authorizes the
United States Congress to exercise only those powers enumerated in
Section 8, Article I, of the Constitution, as well as certain other
powers delegated to Congress by subsequent amendments to the
Constitution. Article VI of the Constitution makes supreme the
Constitution and federal laws enacted pursuant to the Constitution,
further requiring that public officials at all levels and in all
branches of government support the Constitution.
(5) Paragraph 3, Section 8, Article I, of the United
States Constitution delegates to the United States Congress only
the specific power to regulate commerce with "foreign nations, and
among the several states, and with Indian tribes." This provision
was never intended to authorize the federal government to assume
any power beyond the regulation of transactions in those three
specific categories. Through vastly distorted interpretations of
the meaning of the Commerce Clause not authorized by the
Constitution or an amendment to the Constitution, the legislative,
executive, and judicial branches of the federal government have
adopted and implemented countless measures not authorized by the
language or original intent of the clause, many of which usurp the
duties and responsibilities reserved to the states by the Tenth
Amendment.
(6) Paragraph 1, Section 8, Article I, of the United
States Constitution delegates to the United States Congress the
power to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and
general welfare of the United States. The General Welfare Clause
was intended and understood to ensure that Congress, when
exercising an enumerated power, does so in a manner that serves all
states generally, and no state or person singularly.
(7) The final paragraph of Section 8, Article I, of the
United States Constitution delegates to the United States Congress
the limited power to make laws "necessary and proper" to carry into
execution the powers delegated by the Constitution to the United
States government. Using this clause to expand federal power beyond
specifically enumerated powers granted by the Constitution
violates the plain language and original intent of that clause.
(8) The constitutional limitation on the scope of
federal power and the reservation of other powers to the states or
to the people are matters of contract between this state and its
people, and the United States, as of the date this state was
admitted to the United States of America.
(9) The federal government has acted in a manner
inconsistent with the language, intent, and spirit of the United
States Constitution in direct violation of the Constitution and the
contract between this state and its people, and the United States.
This state rejects the unauthorized and excessive abuse of power by
the federal government that infringes on the rights of this state
and its people and that unconstitutionally undermines, diminishes,
and disregards the balance of powers between the states and the
federal government established by the Constitution.
(c) In accordance with the United States Constitution, the
federal government is denied by this state the power to take any
legislative, executive, or judicial action that violates the
Constitution, specifically including those actions that
unconstitutionally undermine, diminish, or disregard the balance
of powers between the states and the federal government established
by the Constitution.
(d) This Act serves as notice from this state to the federal
government to cease and desist any and all unconstitutional
activities that are outside the scope of the power delegated to it
by the United States Constitution, including those activities that
unconstitutionally undermine, diminish, or disregard the balance
of powers between the states and the federal government established
by the Constitution.
(e) This Act calls on all state and local officials,
especially members of law enforcement, prosecutors, members of
local governing bodies, the attorney general, and the governor to
honor their oath to preserve, protect, and defend the United States
Constitution, based on the original intent of that document unless
modified by subsequent constitutional amendment, and as such to
stop unconstitutional federal actions.
(f) This state and its people retain their sovereign power
to regulate the affairs of this state, subject only to the
limitations prescribed by the United States Constitution.
SECTION 2. Subtitle Z, Title 3, Government Code, is amended
by adding Chapter 393 to read as follows:
CHAPTER 393. ENFORCEMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION
Sec. 393.001. DEFINITIONS. In this chapter:
(1) "Committee" means the Joint Legislative Committee
on Constitutional Powers and Enforcement.
(2) "Federal action" includes:
(A) a federal law;
(B) a federal agency rule, policy, or standard;
(C) an executive order of the president of the
United States;
(D) an order of a federal court; and
(E) the making or enforcing of a treaty.
(3) "Unconstitutional federal action" means a federal
action enacted, adopted, or implemented without authority
specifically delegated to the federal government by the people and
the states through the United States Constitution.
Sec. 393.002. JOINT LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE ON
CONSTITUTIONAL POWERS AND ENFORCEMENT. (a) The Joint Legislative
Committee on Constitutional Powers and Enforcement is established
as a permanent joint committee of the legislature.
(b) The committee consists of the following 14 members:
(1) seven members of the house of representatives
appointed by the speaker of the house; and
(2) seven members of the senate appointed by the
lieutenant governor.
(c) Not more than four house members of the committee may be
members of the same political party. Not more than four senate
members of the committee may be members of the same political party.
(d) Members of the committee serve two-year terms beginning
with the convening of each regular legislative session.
(e) If a vacancy occurs on the committee, the appropriate
appointing officer shall appoint a member of the house or senate, as
appropriate, to serve for the remainder of the unexpired term.
(f) The speaker of the house and the lieutenant governor
shall each designate one member of the committee as a joint chair of
the committee.
(g) The committee shall meet at the call of either joint
chair.
(h) A majority of the members of the committee constitute a
quorum.
Sec. 393.003. COMMITTEE REVIEW OF FEDERAL ACTION. (a) The
committee may review any federal action to determine whether the
action is an unconstitutional federal action.
(b) Not later than the 180th day after the date the
committee holds its first public hearing to review a specific
federal action, the committee shall vote to determine whether the
action is an unconstitutional federal action.
(c) The committee may determine that a federal action is an
unconstitutional federal action by majority vote.
(d) The committee shall report to the governor and the
attorney general each federal action that the committee determines
to be an unconstitutional federal action. The committee may include
in the report one or more effective and constitutional ways to
prevent the application of the federal action in this state.
(e) Not later than December 1 of each even-numbered year,
the committee shall submit a report to the speaker of the house of
representatives and the lieutenant governor that lists each federal
action determined by the committee to be an unconstitutional
federal action since the committee's previous report. The committee
shall include in the report one or more recommendations for
effective and constitutional legislative responses to the federal
action.
Sec. 393.004. ATTORNEY GENERAL ACTION. The attorney
general may represent this state or a political subdivision of this
state in an action regarding the refusal or failure of the state or
the political subdivision to participate in the implementation or
enforcement of an unconstitutional federal action.
SECTION 3. (a) Not later than the 30th day following the
effective date of this Act:
(1) the speaker of the house of representatives and
the lieutenant governor shall appoint the initial members of the
Joint Legislative Committee on Constitutional Powers and
Enforcement established under Section 393.002, Government Code, as
added by this Act; and
(2) the secretary of state shall forward official
copies of this Act to the president of the United States, to the
speaker of the House of Representatives and the president of the
Senate of the Congress of the United States, and to all members of
the Texas delegation to Congress with the request that this Act be
officially entered in the Congressional Record.
(b) Not later than the 45th day following the effective date
of this Act, the speaker of the house of representatives and the
lieutenant governor shall forward official copies of this Act to
the presiding officers of the legislatures of the several states.
SECTION 4. This Act takes effect immediately if it receives
a vote of two-thirds of all the members elected to each house, as
provided by Section 39, Article III, Texas Constitution. If this
Act does not receive the vote necessary for immediate effect, this
Act takes effect September 1, 2017.