Legislative Chamber Votes
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Votes Overview

MDN's unique database of legislative roll calls covers the significant legislative votes going back to 1995 -- further back than any other online record of significant Missouri legislative votes, as best I (Phill Brooks) know.

The role calls cover only significant, news worthy votes for which there is a clear issue. Excluded are votes on amendments or substitutes which contain a laundry-list of topics making it impossible to discern the issue upon which legislators actually were voting and also making it impossible to write a simple description on what the vote was about.

Unfortunately, the legislature has begun routinely passing these omnibus, multi-subject amendments and substitutes that are in clear violation of the state Supreme Court's decisions affirming a constitutional provisions restricting bills to a single subject and prohibiting changing the original purpose of a bill.

The descriptions of the votes are written by MDN's director, Phill Brooks, who has covered the legislature for one-half century, making him dean of the statehouse press corps.

Vote List

At the top of the vote list are three buttons you can click to adjust the order of the votes, the date the role call was taken, the bill form/number and description.

The first click will display the list in descending order of the category. A second click of the same button will display the list in ascending order. When you first load VOTES.HTM or call up a new year, the vote list wil be in descending order by date, with the latest vote for that year at the top.

The sort-order of the column you selected is identified by the arrow in the button. indicates a descending order while indicates an ascending order.

The Date button sorts the list in numerical order, putting the latest vote at the top in descending order.

The Chamber: Description button sorts the list in alphabetical order. So in descending order, House chamber votes will be at the top of the list, followed by Senate chamber votes.

The Bill sort is a bit complicated. There are two components to the sort, the bill type (in alphabetical order) followed by the bill number in numerical order (asending or descending order). So, in descending order, HBs would be at the top of the list followed by HJRs, followed by SBs followed SJRs.

One exception are votes such as resolutions, member compaints and confirmation These votes always will be placed at the bottom of the list, regardless whether the selection is in ascending or descending order.

The default order when the VOTES.HTM is loaded in descending order of roll-call dates. So, the latest vote will be at the top.

To see details of a vote including how individual legislators voted along with links to the bill, simply double click the vote in which you are interested.

At the bottom is a selection box to select a different year for the votes display. There also is a selection box to limit the display to the votes taken in a specific chamber. Switching the year or chamber automatically with update the vote list to your selection.

The View simply displays the details of a vote for which you made just one rather than a double click. The vote you selected will be displayed in red.

Vote View

The display of a specific roll call is divided into three panels.

  • Summary Panel: The top panel will contain the total results of the the vote, a link to the bill or joint resolution involved involved in the vote and a summary of what was the central issue of the vote written by MDN's director. Resolutions and other votes that did not involve actual bill or joint resolution will not have a link.

    Note: The NV (not voting) covers those who missed the vote and those who voted present (P). Obviously, someone who voted present did vote, but it simplifies the table and the chart to include those votes in the not-voting figure since voting present essentially is an abstention.

    The summary panel does not include vacant seats, although there will be an indication as to the number of vacancies at the time of the vote.

    Vacant seats will be identified in the list of member votes.

  • Member Vote List Panel: The next panel displays a list of how each member voted.

    At the top of the list scrollable list are four labels you can click to change the order of the display by the vote cast, legislator names, party or legislative district.

    The first click of a label will sort list in ascending order. A second click will resort the list in descending order.

    For example, the first click on Vote label would desplay the list in the over of N, P, Y. A second click would display the list in order of Y, P, N. A ? indicates a vacancy for the designated district.

  • Chart Panel: This is a graphical representation of the role call.

    Like the summary panel, both absent and present votes are included in the NV category.

    The percentages are based on the actual number of members, not all the districts. So, vacant districts are not used to calculate percentages.

    Unlike the summary panel, however, the chart does not include the occasional independent. Since there's never been 1 independent for a few years (in the House) for the period covered by MDN's role call database, the vote bar for the independent would be too small to even appear in the chart.

At the bottom of the panel are one or two buttons:

  • Vote List: This button simply returns you to the list of all the votes for the year you selected.

  • Print: Use this button rather than your browser's print command to print a clean copy of the roll-call information.

    The reason is that your browser's print function will just print what's displayed by the brower. So the votes of members that are not visible in the member vote panel will not get printed.

    With the print button, the summary panel and the full list of the member votes will be printed (in the order you selected -- but not the graphical chart.

    Bill Display

    This is the same as the display for a bill or joint resolution that you can get from /FORMS/BILLS.HTM.

    1. Bill: This line will begin with an asterisk (*) if the bill has been designated by MDN's director as a major bill. Next is the bill bill form followed by the bill number.

      The form will begin with any substitutes approved by a chamber or by a committee (HCS, SCS, HS or SS) -- in recent years House rules have prohibited subsitutes offered during chamber debate (HS). Next will be the bill type (HB, SB, HJR or SJR).

      Note, MDN's database does not include chamber resolutions or General Assembly concurrent resolutions (HR, SR, HCR, SCR). Except in rare occasions, these resolutions have no real legal effect. Instead they just seek to express legislative opinion on a subject.

      There are an occasional worthy of news coverage, but the time time it would take to read hundreds of resolutions to find a rare gem is not work the effort.

    2. Sponsor: Only the primary sponsor is listed, with a link to that member's MDN page. Bills can have a long list of co-sponsors or co-signers, but they have no control over the bill.

      When a bill clears a chamber, the sponsor will pick a bill handler to handle his/her bill in the second chamber. But this is not a particularly formally position.

    3. Status: This is current status of a bill such as the committee to which a bill has been assigned, calendar placement, passage to the governor, placement on the ballot, etc.

      Prior to third reading (a chamber's final vote on a particular version of the bill), the bill must clear the chamber's budget oversight committee that reviews the financial costs or benefits to government from the bill.

      If the bill is on the third-reading calendar, but has not cleared the chamber's budget control committee, the status field for the bill will include (In Budget)

      See below for a detailed flow-chart of the path of a bill or joint resolution to clear the legislature.

      Note, MDN will not identify assignment of a bill to a committee of the chamber of introduction if the assignment is too late for passage -- the fate of many bills in the House. Because committee assignment effectively is meaningless, the status will remain H 2nd Read.

    4. Description: This is a short description of the bill written by MDN's director, Phill Brooks (who has covered the Missouri General Assembly for one-half century). Bills are NOT entered into MDN's database until Phill has had the opportunity to read the bill.

      The description focuses on the most significant and/or news worthy aspect of the bill. Amendments added to a bill that include unrelated subjects may not be included in the description unless the bill clears the legislature.

      Because of the recent trend of the legislature to attach completely unrelated aspects to a bill, it is impossible to provide a description of every component that may have been attached. Do a search of 2019 bills for the word unrelated to understand how frequent this trend has become.

      Many of these amendments are in clear violation of a clearly worded state Supreme Court decision that bills had to be limited to a single topic.

    5. The will include links to more information about the bill in the following order:
      1. Roll Calls: A list of any chamber roll calls that were taken on the bill. MDN's roll call database is limited to significant or news worthy votes. Clicking a roll-call vote will return you to the Vote View page displaying information about the roll call you had selected.

      2. The Fiscal Note(s): A link to fiscal notes written by staff of a joint legislative committee (Legislative Oversight) that deals with state financial issues. A fiscal note reflects the estimate of that staff as to the financial impact to state and local government.

        Besides the financial impact, a fiscal note can provide a far more detailed description about the bill independent of the description written by the staff of the chamber of the bill's introduction.

        Note, however, that not every bill will have a fiscal note written. In recent years, a bill that has little or no change of advancing out of the original chamber's committee will have a fiscal note.

      3. Official legislative description and status: The official legislative page for the bill. This will include links to fiscal notes, House/Senate staff descriptions of the bill and links to journal entries on bill actions.

        Note, however, the General Assembly did not have online website information about legislation prior to 1995. So, for the first ten years of MDN's legislation database (going back to 1985), there are no links to legislative pages for a measure (because they did not exist).

      See:Bill Links below for more information about bill links.

      At the bottom of Bill Display panel will be buttons to return you to the main Vote List page or the Vote Page for the specific roll call you are exploring.

      Outside links deserves a brief explanation. Technically, these links are displayed in an iframe to avoid cluttering your computer with unnecessary pages.

      But there is a problem for printing these pages. Most web browsers prevent changing information from an iframe external link to protect hackers from altering the information that is displayed.

      The problem is that that access restriction prevents the calling page (such as VOTES.HTM) from accessing the infomation to generate a print function.

      Compounding the problem is the House page about a bill or joint resolution. It includes its own seperate iframe to displaying a list of the action taken on the legislation.

      The problem is that a javascript function to print the House page could trigger the prinout before that House iframe of actions had fully loaded.

      There are programming techniques to get around these iframe problems, but I have not implemented that approach because I am not not sure if they would work on every type of browser.

      So, to print one of MDN's iframe-link pages, you will need to right click the page to print the displayed iframe. In FireFox, the print function can be accessed from the "This Frame" option in the menu that will be displayed when you click the right mouse button when the pointer is in the frame.

      The bottom of MDN's link page will include buttons to return to the main vote list, the specific vote page you had been viewing or the bill page from which you called up the link.

      Legislative Steps

      While there eight types of measures before the legislature, this description will use the generic term bill (although some are resolutions).

      Except for single chamber resolutions (HR or SR) the other forms bills (HB or SB), joint resolutions (HJR or SJR) and concurrent resolutions (HCR or SCR) must follow the steps listed below:

      Missouri's Constitution requires that the short "title" of a bill be read on three seperate days in each chamber. That imposes a minimum five day limit for a bill, since after third reading in the chamber or origin, the second chamber can first read the bill on the same day (if it's in session and the first chamber delivered the bill to the second chamber).

      First and second reading are formalities, but third reading is when the chamber votes on the bill to send it to (or back to) the other chamber.

      So, here is a list of the most complicated process a bill can take:

      • 1st Reading: This is just a formality when the bill is introduced in a chamber. Just the title is read in a full-chamber session.

      • 2nd Reading: Like 1st reading, this is a formality in which just the title of the bill is read in a full-chamber session.

      • Committee Assignment: In the Senate, a bill immediately is assigned to committee after 2nd reading, but in the House some bills will not get assigned to committee until the final days of the session.

      • Committee Hearing and Vote: It's up to the committee chair to determine when, if ever, the committee holds a public hearing and then a vote on the bill. Usually, a committee will not vote on a bill on the same day as the hearing.

        In addition, it's also up to the chair to decide when, if ever, a bill approved by the committee is reported to the full chamber for further action.

        It's extremely rare, but a committee chair can kill a bill approved by the committee. Sometimes it's because the chair does not support the bill, but more often it's because of pressure from the leadership because the bill would be too divisive for chamber debate or the leadership doesn't like the bill.

        A committee can vote "do not pass," but that triggers a more complicated process this flow chart will not address since it rarely happens. If the committee wants to kill the bill, the chair simply won't bring the bill up for a vote.

      • Perfection: When a bill is reported out of committee, it's put at the bottom of what's called a perfection calendar.

        Perfection is a fancy title to indicate it's the process to "prefect" the bill with amendments or substitutes (although House rules no prohibit substitutes being offered during chamber perfection.

        Perfection requires just a simple majority (50 percent plus one of the members voting) and often is done with just a voice vote.

      • 3rd Reading: Third reading is the final vote a chamber takes on a bill before sending it to the other chamber. Third reading requires what's termed a "consitutional majority" of more than half of the legislative seats (meaning 82 votes in the House or 18 in the Senate).

        Prior to an actual third reading vote, the bill must be cleared by a budget control committee that evaluates the cost of the bill to government. In recent years, approval has been almost routine, but occasionally a bill will get blocked by a House or Senate budget-controll commmitee

        The constitution actually requires a majority of elected members, suggesting a smaller vote might be required depending on vacancies. But for decades legislative leaders have determined a "constitutional majority" requires a majority of the seats, not members.

      • Other Chamber: After a bill clears the chamber of origin, it faces the same initial steps as in the chamber of origin -- first reading, second reading and then committee assignment, hearing and vote.

        In the second chamber, there is no perfection stage, a bill that clears the second chamber committee goes immediately to a third reading calendar for bills bills from the other chamber.

      • Second Chamber Third Reading: 3rd reading in the second chamber is a compressed process of perfection and 3rd reading in the first chamber.

        Amendments and subsitutes (in the Senate only) can be offered before the final third reading vote that requires a constitutional majority.

        If the second chamber has made not even one-letter change to the original chamber's version, the measure clears the legislature.

      • Back to the Original Chamber: Here the process becomes more complicated and avoids the tedious process of first and second readings. Instead, the measure can clear the legislature with a motion unrestricted by a calendar placement.

        One option is for the original chamber to simply accept the second chamber's version, which requires a 3rd reading vote to clear the legislature.

        A second option is to send the measure to a House-Senate conference committee to work out the difference between the two chambers. That conference committee substitute will require a constitutional majority vote of both chambers to clear the legislature.

        The third option is a gridlock. Occasionally a chamber will refuse to accept a motion to put the issue before a conference committee, a chamber will reject a conference committee compromise or the conference committee cannot reach an agreement.

        In those cases, passage requires one of the chambers to accept and third read (with a constitutional majority) the version passed by the other chamber.

      • What's Next: What happens next to a bill that has cleared legislature depends on a couple of factors.

        If it is a joint resolution that amends the constitution, it requires statewide voter approval to become part of the constitution. The only power a governor has over a constitutional amendment is to select the ballot upon which it will appear.

        Normally a bill requires approval by the governor. But that can be avoided with a provision in the bill to submit the measure to the voters. In that case, like a joint resolution, the only power a governor has the ballot upon which the measure will appear.

      • Governor's Veto or Signing of a bill: Like the federal system, if a governor signs bill, it becomes law.

        If he vetoes the bill, that bill will be subject to an over-ride by the legislature, which requires a two-thirds vote of each chamber. Unless the bill was vetoed early in the legislative session, it will come before a short session in the fall to deal with gubernatorial vetoes.

        But Missouri differs from the federal system if the governor refuses to sign or veto a bill. Under the federal system, failure to sign is called a "pocket veto" -- meaning failure to sign has the same effect as a veto.

        But in Missouri, you could call it a "pocket signature." If a governor refuses to act on a bill, it automatically becomes law. That's happened less than two dozen times in more than three decades.

        Phill Brooks

  • 2000 House Votes
    Date Bill Chamber:  Description
    05/9/2000 HS SB 1053 House: 3rd reading of a bill to prohibit racial profiling by police in traffic stops and require police to report the race, age and gender of drivers who are stopped.
    05/9/2000 SCS HS HB 1677 House: 3rd reading of the Senate-passed version of a bill to require insurance companies to cover damages from some domestic violence incidents.
    05/9/2000 HA 12 HCS SB 922 House: Amendment to a retirement bill to prohibit government retiring plans from recognizing same-sex marriages in retirement benefits.
    05/12/2000 CCS SJR 35 House: Final 3rd reading of a constitutional amendment to repeal the power of the legislature to veto pay increases recommended by the Salary Commission.
    05/12/2000 CCS HB 1797 House: Final 3rd read of a bill to use some insurance tax revenue to fund a motorist insurance database of who has auto insurance.
    05/12/2000 CCS SB 763 House: Final 3rd reading of a bill to regulate and restrict telemarketers and provide a means by which Missourians can be placed on a no-call list.
    05/12/2000 SS HB 1082 House: Final third reading of a bill to require legislative approval for the federal government to acquire some types of land in Missouri.
    05/12/2000 HCS SS SB 678 House: 3rd reading of a large bill that includes in the HCS provisions to exempt the mentally retarded from the death penalty.
    05/12/2000 CCS SB 1053 House: 3rd reading of a bill to prohibit racial profiling by police in traffic stops and require police to report the race, age and gender of drivers who are stopped.
    05/11/2000 HA 11 HS SS SB 934 House: Amendment to the DWI bill to prohibit open alcoholic beverage containers in the passenger areas of cars.
    05/11/2000 HCS SS SJR 35 House: 3rd reading of a constitutional amendment to repeal the power of the legislature to veto pay increase recommendations of the Salary Commission.
    05/11/2000 HS SS SB 934 House: 3rd reading of a bill to lower the blood-alcohol content for drunken driving from .10% to .08%.
    05/08/2000 HCS SS SB 577 House: 3rd reading of a bill to impose fees on dry cleaners to create a fund for cleaning up dry-cleaning solvent pollution.
    05/08/2000 HS SB 858 House: 3rd reading of a bill to toughen the penalties for violating the open meetings and public records law.
    05/08/2000 HSA 1 HA 4 HS SB 858 House: Amendment to the Sunshine bill to lower the proposed maximum fine passed by the Senate from $25,000 to $2,500.
    05/08/2000 HSA 1 HA 1 HS SB 961 House: Amendment to bill to provide a $400 bonus to WW II veterans living in Missouri.
    05/05/2000 HJR 42 House: Motion to table the perfection vote on the Equal Rights Amendment ratification -- effectively a motion to kill the proposal.
    05/05/2000 CCS HB 1742 House: 3rd reading of the CCS version of the bill to limit the amount of bonds the Highways Department can issue, require legislative approval of the bond issue construction plan and issue an immediate $25
    04/27/2000 HCS HB 1961 House: 3rd reading of a bill to make it a felony to steal a pet for the purpose of re-selling it and establish a statewide system to find stolen pets.
    04/27/2000 HS HB 1489 House: 3rd reading of a bill to require school children be vaccinated against hepatitis, with some exceptions.
    04/20/2000 HB 1881 House: House 3rd read of a bill to place all principal arterial highways in St. Louis city under state, rather than city, funding.
    04/20/2000 HCS HB 1569 House: House 3rd read of the "Equal Pay Act" bill to establish new grounds for lawsuits against business on pay discrimination based on gender.
    04/20/2000 HCS HB 1711 House: 3rd reading of a bill that would require HMOs and health insurance to pay pharmacies no less a reimbursement rate than is paid by Medicaid for a prescription drug.
    04/19/2000 HSA 1 HA 5 HS SS SB 549 House: An amendment to the tobacco fund bill that would count tobacco settlement funds as part of the Hancock limit that requires excess state revenues be given to the taxpayers.
    04/18/2000 HA 2 HJR 40 House: An amendment to a constitutional amendment on the salary commission that would prohibit the legislature from giving itself retroactive pay increases.
    04/13/2000 HS HB 1677 House: 3rd reading of a bill to require insurance companies to cover damages from some domestic violence incidents.
    04/11/2000 HA 5 HCS HB 1711 House: Amendment to a drug-pricing bill that would require health insurance pay a pharmacy no less than what Medicaid pays for a prescription drug.
    04/06/2000 HCS HB 1434 House: House 3rd reading of a bill to require annual inspections of amusement rides and establish a state agency to regulate amusement ride safety.
    03/30/2000 HS 2 HA 7 HS HCS HB 1242 House: An amendment to a professional licensing bill to prohibit physican assistants from encourage, counsel or refer patients to abortion services.
    03/28/2000 HA 4 HS HB 1172 House: A House amendment to exclude financial and insurance businesses from a bill that would ban businesses from calling Missourians who had place themselves on a no-call list maintained by the state.
    03/15/2000 HA 2 HCS HB 1110 House: Amendment to the Health Department budget to remove language blocking Planned Parenthood from getting state family planning funds.
    03/08/2000 HB 1082 House: House third read of a bill to require legislative approval for the federal government to acquire some types of land in Missouri.
    03/08/2000 HB 1443 House: House 3rd read to exempt from the sales tax sales of coffins and clothing.
    03/07/2000 HA 4 HCS HB 1076 House: Amendment to require phonics be taught in school to a bill prohibiting peer promotion by schools.
    03/02/2000 HS HJR 61 House: House 3rd read of a proposed constitutional amendment to exclude tobacco settlement funds from tax refunds and define allocation of the funds.
    02/28/2000 HS HJR 61 House: House perfection of a proposed constitutional amendment to exclude tobacco settlement funds from tax refunds and define allocation of the funds.
    02/24/2000 HS HB 1742 House: 3rd reading of a bill to limit the amount of bonds the Highways Department and issue and require legislative approval of the bond issue construction plan.
    02/24/2000 PQ HS HCS HJR 61 House: House motion to shut off debate and block any Republican amendments to the proposed constitutional amendment allocating tobacco settlement funds.
    02/22/2000 HA 1 HB 1443 House: House amendment to a sales tax bill that would exempt the sale of coffins, caskets, urns and other funeral merchandise from the state sales tax.
    02/15/2000 HCS HB 1114 House: House 3rd reading of an emergency appropriations bill that includes pay raises for legislators and statewide elected officials.
    02/08/2000 HSA 1 HA 5 HS HB 1362 House: An amendment to the health insurance bill that removed a provision that would have restricted insurance companies from refusing to provide individual coverage because of pre-existing conditions.
    02/03/2000 HJR 43 House: House 3rd reading of a constitutional amendment to lower the vote needed to pass school bond issues to a simple majority on general election ballots.
    Year:  Chamber: