Michigan Legislature - Terms and Sessions

Terms and Sessions

Every two years the entire House of Representatives stands for election, whereas the Senate does so at four-year intervals concurrently with elections for governor. For reckoning periods of time during which the legislature operates, each two-year period coinciding with the election of new members of the House of Representatives is numbered consecutively as a Legislature dating to the first legislature following Michigan's admission as a state. The current two-year term of the legislature, serving from 2011 until 2013, is the 96th Legislature.

Each year during which the Legislature meets constitutes a new session. According to Article IV Section 13 of the state Constitution, a new session of the Legislature begins when the members of each house convene on the second Wednesday of January every year at noon. A regular session of the Legislature typically lasts throughout the entire year with several periods of recess and adjourns sine die in late December.

There is no minimum or maximum number of days for which a session of the Legislature must meet each year. Although there is no universal definition as to what constitutes a full-time legislature, the Michigan Legislature is one of only eleven full-time legislative bodies in the United States. Members of the Michigan Legislature receive a base salary of $71,650 per year which makes them the second-highest paid legislators in the country, after California. While legislators in many states receive daily per diems that make up for lower salaries, Michigan legislators receive $1,000 per month for office expenses.

Any legislation pending in either house at the end of a session that is not the end of a legislative term of office continues and carries over to the next legislative session.