The quickest way to improve Congress involves some very minor changes:
1. Washington is corrupt because of the power concentrated there. Send Congress home for 27 weeks out of every year. They, the Congressmen and Senators are supposed to work for us so why aren’t they “home with us”? Any Congressional junket counts as time spent in Washington. Want to bet trips to Antarctica and Taiwan would suddenly stop?
2. Washington is corrupt because there is no feedback - they literally don’t know how much they are spending. At the opening of Congress and then monthly thereafter have the Treasury Department “balance the books” by telling Congress how much their various bills have spent out of the funds available to that Congress. We do it every time we write a check so why don’t they? When Congress has spent the last dime they are either done for the year or every bill thereafter had to have a new tax bill to support it.
3. Every bill presented has an automatic sunset provision. The law goes off the books unless Congress renews it and confirms the funding. This should reduce the building of empires as the financial crunch caused by # 2 above takes effect. We do it in our own budgets why not Congress?
4, Finally, any Congressional activity not accomplished during its 25 weeks inside the Beltway can not be automatically carried over to the next session; it was follow the same process as a brand new bill.
Congress has considerable power to grant themselves perks and privileges not available to the rest of us. Why not make them work for them?
While this has appeal it whould present some practical obsticals.
If you had to resubmit and debate every bill that is past periodically there would be no time left for new laws. Especially with only 25 weeks in a session.