Holman Rule

The Holman Rule is a rule in the United States House of Representatives that allows amendments to appropriations legislation that would reduce the salary of or fire specific federal employees, or cut a specific program. The rule was first enacted in 1876 and rescinded in 1983, and was reinstated in January 2017 on a temporary basis.

The rule is an exception to the prohibition against provisions in appropriations legislation that change existing law. Prior to the rule's reinstatement in 2017, cuts could be made to agencies broadly, but not to specific programs or employees.

Examples of the rule's use include the elimination of 29 customs positions in 1932 and another eight in 1939, a provision reducing the number of naval officers in 1938, and a 1952 amendment disallowing the filling of vacancies in independent agencies until the agency's workforce had been reduced by 10%. Historically, it does not appear to have been used to cut a specific worker's salary with the intent of incentivizing them to quit. The rule cannot be used if the reductions are contingent on other events, or to give broad authority to agency heads to fire workers.

The constitutionality of bills passed under the Holman Rule has been questioned by legal scholars in light of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in United States v. Lovett (1946). That case dealt with an act of Congress, passed during the Red Scare, that defunded the salaries of 39 employees accused of having Communist sympathies. The Court held that, under these circumstances, the Act was no "mere appropriation measure", but was effectively a bill of attainder prohibited by Article I, Section 9, of the Constitution.

Prior to 1983, the Holman Rule was part of Rule XXI, Clause 2 of the Rules of the House of Representatives, and stated that an amendment to an appropriations bill is allowed if it, "being germane to the subject matter of the bill, shall retrench expenditures by the reduction of the number and salary of the officers of the United States, by the reduction of the compensation of any person paid out of the Treasury of the United States, or by the reduction of amounts of money covered by the bill".

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