Scheduling:
Senate practice today generally concedes to the Majority Leader the prerogative of arranging the floor schedule of the Senate and making unanimous consent requests and motions to proceed to consider bills and other items of business. The Majority Leader is also chiefly responsible for negotiating unanimous consent agreements governing the consideration of items of business.

Scope of Differences:
Limits within which a conference committee is permitted to resolve its disagreement.

Scorekeeping:
A procedure used by the Congressional Budget Office for up-to-date tabulations of congressional actions on bills and resolutions that provide new budget authority and outlays or change revenues and the public debt for a fiscal year. Such reports include, but are not limited to, status reports on the budgetary effects of these congressional actions to date and of potential congressional actions and comparisons of these actions to targets and ceilings set by Congress in the budget resolution.

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Second:
The number of members required to indicate support for an actions, such as calling for a vote.

Second-Degree Amendment:
An amendment to an amendment. Also called a perfecting amendment. (See also Perfecting Amendment.)

Second Reading:
Required reading of a bill or joint resolution to a chamber: in the House, in full before floor consideration in the House or Committee of the Whole (usually dispensed with by unanimous consent or special rule); in the Senate, by title only, before referral to a committee.

Secretaries, Party:
The Secretary for the Majority and the Secretary for the Minority are elected to serve as scheduling and information coordinators between the party floor leaders and individual senators within the party. The party secretaries may also assist their party conference with its work.

Secretary of the Senate:
Chief administrative and budgetary officer of the Senate, responsible for overseeing the duties of Senate employees, educating Senate pages, administering oaths, handling the registration of lobbyists, and handling other tasks necessary for the continuing operation of the Senate. The Secretary is almost always a candidate of the majority party and the majority leader.  The Secretary affirms the accuracy of bill text by signing all measures that pass the Senate. The Secretary supervises the preparation and printing of bills and reports, the publication of the Congressional Record and Senate journals, and other matters.   (See also Clerk of the House.)

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Self-Executing Rule:
If specified, the House's adoption of a special rule may also have the effect of amending or passing the underlying measure.  Also called a "hereby" rule.

Select or Special Committee:
A committee set up for a special purpose usually for a limited time by resolution of either the House or Senate. Most special committees are investigative and lack legislative authority. Legislation is not referred to them and they cannot report bills to their parent chamber. There are now, however, select committees in both houses that are permanent and have legislative authority. The Senate has permanent select committees on Ethics and Indian Affairs and both houses have a permanent select committee on intelligence. (See also Standing Committees.)

Senate Manual:
A document that contains the Senate's standing rules and orders and other laws and regulations that apply to the Senate. It is usually published once each new Congress.

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Senator:
The Constitution requires that a senator be at least 30 years old, a citizen of the United States for at least nine years, and an inhabitant of the state from which he or she is elected. A person elected or appointed to the Senate and duly sworn is a senator. 

Senatorial Courtesy:
Sometimes referred to as "the courtesy of the Senate," it is a general practice - with no written rule - applied to consideration of executive nominations. Generally, it means that nominations from a state are not to be confirmed unless they have been approved by the senators of the president’s party of that state, with other senators following their colleagues’ lead in the attitude they take toward consideration of such nominations. Senatorial courtesy also applies to sitting or former senators who are nominated, allowing them to be quickly confirmed. (See also Nominations.) 

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Seniority:
The status given senators according to their length of service, which entitles a senator with greater seniority to preferential treatment in matters such as committee assignments.

Sequester/Sequestration:
The cancellation of budgetary resources pursuant to the Budget Enforcement Act of 1990. If canceled, sequestration funds will not be available for obligation or expenditure. Sequestration may occur in response to the enactment of appropriations that cause a breach in the discretionary spending limits, the enactment of revenue, direct spending legislation that causes a net increase in the deficit, or the estimation of a deficit in excess of the maximum deficit amount.

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Sergeant at Arms:
The chief security officer of the Senate, the Sergeant at Arms and staff in the office help to preserve order in the Senate chamber, the Senate galleries, and the Senate side of the Capitol. The Sergeant at Arms is elected by the Senate upon the nomination of the majority party conference.

Session:
The period during which Congress assembles and carries on its regular business. Each Congress generally has two regular sessions (a first session and a second session), based on the constitutional mandate that Congress assemble at least once each year.

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Simple Resolution:
Designated "S. Res.," simple resolutions are used to express nonbinding positions of the Senate or to deal with the Senate's internal affairs, such as the creation of a special committee. They do not require action by the House of Representatives.

Sine Die:
(See also Adjournment Sine Die.)

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Slip Laws:
A few days after a law has been enacted, it is officially published first as a "slip law."  The first official publication of a bill that has been enacted and signed into law. Each is published separately in unbound single-sheet or pamphlet form. (See also Law, Statutes at Large, U.S. Code.)

Speaker:
The presiding officer of the House of Representatives, selected by the caucus of the party to which he/she belongs and formally elected by the whole House.

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Special Session:
A session of Congress after it has adjourned sine die, completing its regular session. The president convenes special sessions.

Spending Authority:
The 1974 budget act defines authority as borrowing authority, contract authority, and entitlement authority for which budget authority is not provided in advance by appropriations acts.

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Sponsor:
(See also Bills Introduced.)

Stage of Disagreement:
Stage at which one chamber formally disagrees with an amendment proposed by the other chamber and insists on its own amendment. A measure generally cannot go to conference until this stage is reached.

Standing Committee:
Committees permanently established by House and Senate rules. The standing committees are legislative committees. Legislation may be referred to them and they may report bills and resolutions to their parent chambers. (See also Select or Special Committees.)

Standing Vote:
A non-recorded vote used in both the House and Senate. (A standing vote is also called a division vote.) Members in favor of a proposal stand and are counted by the presiding officer. Then members opposed stand and are counted. There is no record of how individual members voted.

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Star Print:
A reprint of a measure, amendment, or committee report to correct errors in a previous printing. The first page carries a small black star.

Statutes At Large:
A chronological arrangement of the laws enacted in each session of Congress. Though indexed, the laws are not arranged by subject matter, and there is no indication of how they changed previously enacted laws. (See also Law, Slip Laws, U.S. Code.)

Statutory Limit on the Public Debt:
The maximum amount, established in law, of public debt that can be outstanding. The limit covers virtually all debt incurred by the Federal Government (primarily the Treasury Department), including borrowing from trust funds, but excludes some debt incurred by agencies.

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Strike and Insert:
Amendment that replaces text in a measure or an amendment.

Strike from the Record:
Remarks made on the House floor may offend some member, who moves that the offending words be "taken down" for the Speaker’s cognizance, and then expunged from the debate as published in the Congressional Record. 

Strike the Last Word/Strike the Requisite Number of Words:
Also called a pro forma amendment. Means of obtaining time to speak on an amendment without actually offering a substantive change. (See also Pro Forma Amendment.)

Structured Rule:
Another term for a modified open or modified closed rule.

Subcommittee:
Subunit of a committee established for the purpose of dividing the committee's workload. Recommendations of a subcommittee must be approved by the full committee before being reported to the Senate.

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Substitute/Substitute Amendment:
A motion, amendment or entire bill introduced in place of the pending legislative business. Passage of a substitute measure kills the original measure by supplanting it. The substitute also may be amended. (See also Amendment in the Nature of a Substitute.)

Supplemental Appropriations Bill:
Legislation appropriating funds after the regular annual appropriations bill for a federal department or agency has been enacted. A supplemental appropriation provides additional budget authority beyond original estimates for programs or activities, including new programs authorized after the enactment of the regular appropriation act, for which the need for funds is too urgent to be postponed until enactment of the next year’s regular appropriations bill. 

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Supplemental, Minority, and Additional Views:
Senate Rule XXVI requires that, when a committee (other than the Appropriations Committee) reports a measure, committee members may have three days to file statements providing their views on the measure, which will be included in the committee's written report.

Surplus:
Excess of revenues over outlays.

Suspend the Rules:
Often a timesaving procedure for passing bills in the House. The wording of the motion, which may be recognized by the Speaker, is, "I move to suspend the rules and pass bill . . . ." A favorable vote by two-thirds of those present is required for passage. Debate is limited to 40 minutes, and no amendments from the floor are permitted. If a two-thirds favorable vote is not attained, the bill may be considered later under regular procedures. The suspension procedure is in order ever Monday and Tuesday and is intended to be reserved for non-controversial bills.

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URL:  TheCapitol.Net/glossary/s.htm      Last updated: January 01, 2008