Peterson Family Singers: Florida Vacation, Day 3 (TeenPact Congress)

Tuesday was SO much fun! After worship and devotion together in the House chamber at the Capitol, we split up into House and Senate... reporters were free to walk around wherever they chose, taking pictures and interviewing legislators. As Rep. Cockroft said, "Remember, they're always watching... you never know what might show up in tomorrow's newspaper. And yes, I speak from experience."

Representative Cockroft giving us that very sage advice...

In the House chamber, we Representatives were assigned to seats by our last names... since Cam and I had the same last name, we got to choose which seat we each sat in. When passing notes, things got a little confusing as I kept getting her notes and she kept getting mine. Explanation/story to come on that; it was highly amusing!

Tuesday was the first day of "TP Leg," or actually debating on and passing bills in the House and Senate. As in committee, bills were read by title only and the sponsor was given a limited amount of time to speak on the bill and then a time to answer technical, non-debatable questions. After that, there was usually a round (or two) of pro/con debate, then the bill sponsor had three minutes to close, and we voted on the bill.

Rep. Kolssak (also TeenPact Illinois state governor) speaking on his bill

One of the duties of the lobbyists was to act as pages, running notes in between the House and Senate. The notes were screened by the moms sitting in the back to make sure they were on-topic and appropriate, and then they were delivered by the lobbyists to whomever they were directed. The notes were the way we could keep up with which bills were being passed or failed, what amendments were being made (quite important!), which bills were next on the docket, etc. These notes were quite useful... Camryn's and my minor problem was that many of the lobbyists seemed to be under the impression that I was Camryn and Camryn was Sylvia! Eventually we "switched names," meaning that I wrote "Camryn Peterson" on the notes I sent and Camryn wrote "Sylvia Peterson" on the notes that she sent. It worked for a little while... and then the lobbyists learned our actual names and it didn't work anymore. So we switched back to using our real names... sure enough, Camryn started getting my notes again and I got hers. XD We gave up trying to keep them straight; it wasn't as if it really mattered anyway!

Caption, anyone? >:D

Speaker of the House Danny Sullivan and clerk Anna Heritage

During lunch hour: simultaneously taking pictures of each other taking pictures, and each being photobombed...

Camryn speaking on a bill

Later in the afternoon, there was a short press conference: the reporters' time to shine!

The House and Senate leaders (Speaker of the House, President of Senate, floor leaders, majority and minority leaders, whips, clerks... I'm probably forgetting a position or two)