Over the years I've had many a discussion regarding how a bill becomes a statute and how the statute becomes law. Most recently a discussion along those lines involved HR 3200, the so called health care reform bill. The debater's primary point was why all the fuss over the Democrat's health care plans when there isn't even a bill ready to be passed? Obviously because it's important to prevent a potentially harmful bill from being assembled let alone being passed and here's why in a nutshell: One seldom finds specificity in a raw statute. In today's uber-partisan political atmosphere (I'm a partisan), the statute is often little more than a congressional means to an executive branch end. "party" politics are in play and in order to provide maximum flexibility to the party in control of the executive branch, statutes are constructed in nebulous terms. Federal courts define statutory language as "broad authorizing language" which can seem innocuous to the untrained reader. Politicians love hiding behind the vagueness of a bill's artfully crafted language because it allows them to claim provisions feared by their opponents don't really appear in the legislation.
Unfortunately, a statute, even after being passed by the house and senate, and signed by the president, is not stand alone law. In order to become an enforcible law, needful and specific implementing regulations must be promulgated by the appropriate executive branch department. That's where the true nature of a bill becomes evident. Without "implementing" regulations written and published in the Federal Register, a statute lacks the required specificity to pass constitutional muster. Congress delegates authority to promulgate regulations to the proper executive branch department. In the case of the health care bill HR 3200 for instance, responsibility would be delegated to: 1. the Secretary of HHS; and 2. the Secretary of the Treasury, which in turn delegates specific enforcement authority to the commissioner of the IRS.
The Secretary has broad powers to interpret the authorizing language and congressional intent of the statute and then to implement it in whatever way suits the public policy goals of the administration. Hence, it is unlikely anyone will know the so called unintended consequences of a legislative enactment until it's too late to do anything about it. And that's why sweeping legislation such as the health care reform act causes so much consternation and alarm. It's too vague, too broad and leaves too much to our faith or "trust" in the agencies authorized to implement it. One might look at the bill HR 3200 and say, well there's no specific reference to Death Panels for instance. True, yet the implication exists and there is no prohibition against the creation of such an entity; which means the Secretary of HHS at the behest of the POTUS could interpret the raw statute to find that intent and, by writing specific regulations, could implement the pertinent part of the statute to enable the creation of a panel commissioned to accomplish that policy goal. All without further authorization from congress.
One can see why the character and politics of those who advise the president on policy matters and of those whom he appoints to implement policy is so important to know. There are at minimum three policy czars that would have direct input on health care and two are known for their radical positions and statements. Do you really want radical policy Czars like Cass Sunstein or John Holdren involved in the implementation of health care policy? Nancy Ann De Parle was appointed by Katherine Sebelius to fill the role of health reform czar. These are unelected but very powerful people. How a statute is interpreted and implemented is affected by their input. And then there's Sebelius herself. A death panel of one when it comes to abortion rights. One has to read the tea leaves , connect some dots, read between the lines, anticipate the consequences of a bill's passage, because the damage done to our health care system once the bill is passed into law will actually be caused by implementing regulations promulgated in the executive branch to carry out policy, and by then it will be too late.