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Do they ever adjourn early?

By Elizabeth Lincoln

Everyone's been asking--does the Legislature ever adjourn early? 

Since flexible sessions began in 1973, the Legislature has never adjourned early in the first half of the biennium.  The Minnesota Constitution limits the length of a regular session in two ways—it requires that the Legislature adjourn by the first Monday after the third Saturday in May of any year and it limits the number of legislative days in a biennium to 120. 

The second year of the biennium is another story—they have adjourned sine die before the constitutional adjournment date in all but two years since 1973.  And those two years are subject to interpretation.  On May 16, 2010, the Legislature adjourned a day before the deadline.   But they adjourned with unfinished business and went into special session on May 17th.  In 2002, the House adjourned two days before the required adjournment date of May 20th but the Senate didn’t adjourn until the deadline.

The Legislature has adjourned as early as March four times-- over fifty days before the May deadline..  The earliest March date was March 17th in 1986.  Other March adjournments happened in 1974, 1978, and 1982.  March 29, 1974 was notable because they had already used 116 of the allotted 120 legislative days.

The Legislative Reference Library has a detailed chart on the dates and number of legislative days for regular and special sessions.  We compiled a spreadsheet showing details on adjournments too.

It remains to be seen when adjournment will occur this year!