Indiana’s Legislature: More Bills, Modest Results -- tells of do nothing policians.

INDIANA IGA COSTS MORE THAN IT IS WORTH

A recent report from FiscalNote, highlighted in August 2025, casts a sharp light on how state legislatures across the country performed in turning proposed legislation into law. HE advocates DOGE-ING Indiana and the IGA. The findings show wide gaps in effectiveness — with states like Colorado converting nearly three-quarters of bills into law, while others, like Connecticut, rank near the bottom with only 5.7 percent of proposals enacted.

Indiana’s numbers place it closer to the middle of the pack, but the statistics reveal a legislature that is busy without being particularly effective.

During the 2025 session, Indiana lawmakers introduced over 1,200 bills, yet only about 31.9 percent were enacted into law. That figure edges out the national average passage rate of 28 percent, but it falls well short of high-performing states.

In FiscalNote’s comparative ranking of legislative effectiveness, Indiana stood at 24th in the nation — technically above average, but hardly impressive when framed against the thousands of hours spent drafting legislation that ultimately went nowhere.

The disparity is stark: Colorado led the nation with a 74 percent passage rate, while Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Connecticut all landed near the bottom. Connecticut in particular earned the unenviable distinction of being fourth worst in the country, with lawmakers introducing 4,064 bills but seeing only 232 become law.

For Indiana, the story is one of moderate efficiency cloaked in inefficiency. Legislators push through hundreds of measures, but less than a third of them survive the process. When ranked alongside other states, Hoosiers are left with the impression of a government that is active but not especially effective.

This inefficiency has real consequences: policy priorities stall, public resources are wasted on bills that never advance, and voters may reasonably question whether their representatives are delivering meaningful results. In a state where over a thousand proposals are introduced in a single session, Hoosiers may ask — what is the point if two-thirds of that work dies in committee or on the chamber floor?

Worse still, the legislature has done nothing to rein in the Indiana Supreme Court’s abusive practices in attorney discipline, where the justices exercise exclusive authority over the state bar. Disciplinary cases often function as lawmaking by another name — lawfare and selective prosecution aimed at a few attorneys to instill fear in the greater profession. By failing to act, Indiana’s lawmakers have allowed a judicial monopoly that chills advocacy, discourages young lawyers from entering practice, and leaves whole regions of the state underserved at a time when the lawyer shortage is already acute.

The FiscalNote report makes clear that Indiana’s General Assembly is not among the most dysfunctional in the country — but neither is it close to being a model of effectiveness.

With the legislature ranking 24th out of 50 states, Indiana remains a state legislature stuck in the middle, doing just enough to escape embarrassment but not nearly enough to inspire confidence — or to check the overreach of the state’s highest court.