Connecticut’s government is led by six full-time state constitutional officers at the mid-point of four-year terms: Gov. Ned Lamont, Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz, Secretary of the State Stephanie Thomas, Comptroller Sean Scanlon, Treasurer Erick Russell and Attorney General William Tong. All are Democrats.

The General Assembly is a bicameral, part-time legislative body with 151 House and 36 Senate members, each representing districts with borders adjusted after every decennial census to ensure equal populations. Legislative districts need not coincide with municipal borders; some include a portion of a community, while others may span several.

The Judicial Branch has three levels of courts: the Superior Court for civil and criminal trials, an intermediate nine-member Appellate Court, and a seven-member Supreme Court. Its jurists are nominated by the governor and confirmed by the General Assembly for eight-year terms. Barring cause, jurists traditionally are nominated to subsequent eight-year terms until reaching the mandatory retirement age of 70.

Members of Connecticut’s General Assembly are elected to two-year terms. There are no term limits, but there is regular turnover. For example, 29 of the 36 senators were elected in the last 10 years.

The General Assembly is older than the U.S. government, but its modern form was established by a state constitutional amendment that was adopted in 1970 and took effect in 1972. At the same time, the House was shrunk for the second time in 10 years from 177 to 151 seats. The amendment also mandated annual sessions.

The legislature now meets for five months in odd-numbered years and three months in even-numbered ones. It also has the option to meet in special sessions.

In odd numbered years, the state Constitution dictates that the annual session begins on the first Wednesday after the first Monday in January. A biennial budget is proposed by the governor and adopted by the General Assembly. The session ends no later than midnight on the first Wednesday after the first Monday in June.

Legislative pay increased in 2023 for the first time in two decades under the terms of a law passed in 2022. The same law pegged future raises to a federal measure of wage growth, the Employment Cost Index.

In 2025, base pay for lawmakers will rise from $40,000 to $43,600, with an additional $4,500 paid to House members and $5,550 paid to senators for unvouchered expenses. Pay for the top two leaders, the House speaker and Senate president pro tem, will go from $52,000 to $56,680. 

Also, many lawmakers have a leadership title that carries additional pay. Annual compensation for committee co-chairs and assistant leaders, for example, is $50,685.

Lawmakers also will get a 4.5% increase in 2026. 

Bills are proposed by members of the General Assembly in either the House or Senate. The governor can also introduce his own legislation, which are technically proposed by House and Senate leaders.

The legislature has 27 permanent committees whose jurisdictions are determined by subject matter. The committees’ membership reflects the proportions of Democrats and Republicans in the General Assembly. An exception is the bipartisan Regulation Review Committee, whose membership is evenly divided.

Unlike Congress, the Connecticut General Assembly has joint committees of House and Senate members, each with a House and Senate co-chair and a House and Senate ranking member of the minority party.

BIlls are referred to committees that have “cognizance” in legislative parlance, or jurisdiction over certain subject matter. For example, all bills affecting taxation will be referred to the Finance, Revenue and Bonding Committee. Anything with a criminal penalty must go to the Judiciary Committee. Some bills might be referred to multiple committees, depending on their content.

A bill’s first hurdle for passage is a committee vote to raise the bill for a public hearing. The public can testify in person at public hearings or submit written testimony. A bill can die from inaction or a negative vote in a committee or be sent to the floor of the House or Senate with a joint favorable report, or if substantially revised, a joint favorable substitution. 

Every committee has a deadline set in the joint rules for reporting bills to the floor. Those are known as “J.F.,” or joint favorable, deadlines.

A legislative reform movement aimed at ending the legislature’s dependence on the executive branch created two full-time, non-partisan legislative agencies: The Office of Legislative Research and Office of Fiscal Analysis.

The General Assembly has an online bill tracking system that includes texts of bills, summaries and fiscal notes written by the offices of Legislative Research and Fiscal Analysis, public hearing testimony and roll call votes.

The public can watch committee meetings, public hearings and legislative sessions on CT-N or committee YouTube channels.

Generally, about the first two thirds of every annual session is dedicated to the committee process of drafting, hearing and revising bills that eventually will get to the House or Senate. No bill can become law without passage by both chambers and either the consent of the governor or an override of his veto by a two-thirds vote.

The process can be circumvented by the legislature’s top leaders, the House speaker and Senate president pro tem, signing an emergency certification declaration. An emergency-certified bill can go directly to a floor vote without a public hearing or committee approval.

Bills can be revised or wholly rewritten through floor amendments. The decision whether to call a bill for a floor vote resides with the House speaker or Senate president pro tem.

By tradition, the General Assembly allows unlimited debate on any bill.

Unlike Congress, where a bill can remain active for a two-year session, any bill not passed by the General Assembly before the annual constitutional adjournment deadline is deemed dead. To be considered the following year, it must once again go through the committee process.

Generally, before a floor vote every bill is reviewed by the nonpartisan Office of Fiscal Analysis for projected costs to the state and to municipalities, an assessment known as a fiscal note. Similarly, the Office of Legislative Research, also nonpartisan, prepares a plain-language summary of what the bill does.

Connecticut budgets in two-year cycles, a method begun in the mid-1990s to improve long-term financial planning.

In odd-numbered years, the governor and legislature adopt both a biennial budget and a two-year bond package to cover financing for capital projects such as municipal school construction and transportation infrastructure work. During even-numbered years, legislators review – but are not required to revise – the second year of each two-year plan.

In all sessions, the budget work generally begins with a presentation from the governor. Though it is delivered on the first Wednesday after the first Monday in February, it is the culmination of months of work by dozens of state agencies led by the Office of Policy and Management, a process that typically begins the previous September.

Spending recommendations from the governor are referred to the Appropriations Committee while proposals involving taxes, fees and borrowing are sent to the Finance, Revenue and Bonding Committee.

The legislative panels typically hold multiple public hearings and break the governor’s plans down into several components, which are reviewed by subcommittees. Both the Appropriations and Finance committees develop counter-proposals to the governor’s recommendations.

Another key element occurs on or about April 30 when the legislature’s Office of Fiscal Analysis and the governor’s budget staff prepare a joint assessment of the tax and other revenues state government can expect in the upcoming budget cycle.

This all eventually leads to negotiations for a budget and bond package compromise between legislative leaders and the governor’s office that the full House and Senate must adopt. 

If the plan complies with the state spending cap – a mechanism that tries to keep the growth in appropriations in line with household income and inflation – a simple majority is required. But lawmakers legally can exceed the cap with a 60% vote in each chamber and the governor’s consent. 

If a budget and/or bond package is vetoed by the governor, lawmakers would need a two-third’s majority to override. Otherwise, they would resume negotiations.

The goal each spring is to adopt a new biennial plan, or to revise the second year of a previously adopted plan, before the fiscal year starts on July 1.