KA...the challenge was NOT upheld by the US Court of Appeals, I did could find SC decision on the case...if there is none then the Senate and the House passed 2 different bills then the Senate bill signed by GB.
United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit.
Argued February 9, 2007.
Decided May 29, 2007
Article I of the United States Constitution requires that before proposed legislation may "become[] a Law," U.S. CONST. art. I, 7, cl. 2, "(1) a bill containing its exact text [must be] approved by a majority of the Members of the House of Representatives; (2) the Senate [must] approve[] precisely the same text; and (3) that text [must be] signed into law by the President," Clinton v. City of New York, 524 U.S. 417, 448, 118 S.Ct. 2091, 141 L.Ed.2d 393 (1998). Public Citizen, a not-for-profit consumer advocacy organization, filed suit in District Court claiming that the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005, Pub.L. No. 109-171, 120 Stat. 4 (2006) ("DRA" or "Act"), is invalid because the bill that was presented to the President did not first pass both chambers of Congress in the exact same form. In particular, Public Citizen contends that the statute's enactment did not comport with the bicameral passage requirement of Article I, Section 7 of the Constitution, because the version of the legislation that was presented to the House contained a clerk's error with respect to one term, so the House and Senate voted on slightly different versions of the bill and the President signed the version passed by the Senate. Public Citizen asserts that it is irrelevant that the Speaker of the House and the President pro tempore of the Senate both signed a version of the proposed legislation identical to the version signed by the President. Nor does it matter, Public Citizen argues, that the congressional leaders' signatures attest that indistinguishable legislative text passed both houses.
2
The District Court held that Public Citizen's bicameralism claim is foreclosed by the Supreme Court's decision in Marshall Field & Co. v. Clark, 143 U.S. 649, 12 S.Ct. 495, 36 L.Ed. 294 (1892). See Public Citizen v. Clerk, U.S. Dist. Ct. for D.C., 451 F.Supp.2d 109 (D.D.C. 2006). In that case, the Court held that the judiciary must treat the attestations of "the two houses, through their presiding officers" as "conclusive evidence that [a bill] was passed by Congress." Marshall Field, 143 U.S. at 672-73, 12 S.Ct. 495. Under Marshall Field, a bill signed by the leaders of the House and Senatean attested "enrolled bill"establishes that Congress passed the text included therein "according to the forms of the Constitution," and it "should be deemed complete and unimpeachable." Id. at 672-73, 12 S.Ct. 495. Recognizing that Marshall Field's "enrolled bill rule" prohibited it from questioning the congressional pedigree of the bill signed by the Speaker and President pro tempore, the District Court dismissed Public Citizen's complaint and denied its motion for summary judgment. Public Citizen, 451 F.Supp.2d 109.
