By Barbara Hoberock, Oklahoma Voice
OKLAHOMA CITY – A former Oklahoma lawmaker wants to dramatically alter how the Legislature conducts business.
Former Rep. Charles Key, R-Oklahoma City, filed paperwork with the Oklahoma Secretary of State to circulate a proposed constitutional amendment that would require three bills from every lawmaker to be heard in committee. State Question 839 would also require any bills advanced from committee to be heard on the House or Senate floor.
Key, who served in the House for 18 years, said the problem is too few have too much power, which impacts constituents.
Key said lobbyists and large money donors behind the scenes pick which bills get heard.
“It means people from rural districts or not in leadership are not getting legislation that reflects their values,” said Sen. Shane Jett, R-Shawnee, chairman of the Freedom Caucus.
The organization has been critical of the current process where leadership assigns bills to committees and chairs determine what gets heard.
Jett said lobbyists give the bulk of their contributions to leadership and to those who chair committees.
The current process allows members to hide from difficult votes because bills are not being heard, leaving their constituents wondering where lawmakers stand on policy issues, Jett said.
Key said he doesn’t think the measure, if approved by voters, will fully fix a broken system, but it will have an impact.
“This is about fairness and equality,” Key said.
But critics of the idea say there is a difference between a bill that has been copied from another state or organization and those that have been well-researched and vetted over several years.
“Every idea does not have equal merit,” said Senate Minority Leader Julia Kirt, D-Oklahoma City.
It should not be easy to pass a law, said House Majority Floor Leader Josh West, R-Grove. West is involved in determining which bills get heard on the House floor.
“We are here to create good laws,” West said. “Not all bills become law for a reason.”
Hundreds of bills didn’t get a committee hearing in 2025, including Senate Bill 581, by Sen. Dusty Deevers, R-Elgin, that would have allowed residents, employees and businesses to be paid in gold or silver bullion.
Another Deevers measure, Senate Bill 738, would have required county sheriffs to protect people from infringements on rights guaranteed in the U.S. and Oklahoma constitutions.
House Bill 1006, by Rep. Jim Olsen, R-Roland, requiring classrooms to display the Ten Commandments, also wasn’t heard.
West said the current process works, but it requires members to garner support for their legislation, which is often done behind the scenes.
Senate Majority Floor Leader Julie Daniels, R-Bartlesville, said some bills are repeats of ideas that have not worked in the past. Others may be premature or in conflict with other laws or policies, she said.
A lot of factors go into determining which bills will be heard, said Daniels, a key player in determining which Senate proposals will be brought up for a vote.
She said the Oklahoma Legislature is one of the most conservative in the country and has passed bills that reflect that ideology.
But the body does not necessarily pass each iteration of a policy, she said.
Lawmakers say it is not possible to hear the thousands of bills filed during a legislative session, which runs from February until the end of May.
House members are currently limited to filing eight bills that are possible for committee consideration.
The Senate has no limit.
“Certainly lobbyists, associations or individual constituents can bring an argument that is very persuasive,” Daniels said. “To say just because an argument comes from a lobbyist is invalid or questionable rejects entirely the knowledge and information they can bring to an issue that is not easily agreed upon by all sides.”
In 1990, voters approved a measure that prohibited lawmakers from serving more than 12 years. It became effective with the 1992 election. Although billed as a way to generate fresh ideas, one of the results was a loss of institutional knowledge in the House and Senate, which some observers say puts more power in the hands of staff and lobbyists.
James Milner has been a lobbyist for more than 35 years.
“If you talk to any member, particularly the new ones, they will tell you that if it weren’t for lobbyists coming by and explaining the issue and giving them a perspective of it, they would not know or understand what they are voting on,” Milner said.
