What is an ABR? Is it Important?
Each bill that is drafted by the Legislative Reference Bureau includes a short summary phrase called an ABR. The ABR is used for digest purposes, and is also displayed on the electronic voting boards in each chamber. The ABR appears with all capitalized letters and is limited to 30 total characters including spaces.
The ABR will commonly include a reference to the Act being amended and/or the affected State agency. Ideally, the ABR also includes at least one key word that would make it easy for someone to identify the bill by subject matter.
It is easy to identify shell bills using the ABR because these ABRs follow a very set formula. A shell bill ABR will list the subject matter of the bill, accompanied by the word "tech". For example, a shell bill for transportation legislation would have an ABR of "TRANSPORTATION-TECH".
More information about the ABR, including common abbreviations of Acts and agencies and other shorthand that is used in drafting the ABR, can be found in Section 40-25 of the Illinois Bill Drafting Manual.
A recent Capitol Fax post (available by clicking here) highlights how an ABR can potentially make or break a bill. The post reproduces an email from Rep. Jeanne Ives, in which she describes how a bill which deleted references to an obsolete fee received 47 NO votes, simply because the ABR had the words "TIRE FEE" in it.