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Would you ever purchase a bag of apples when half the bag is filled with rotten ones? I'd guess not, even if some of the apples taste great. Unfortunately, purchasing a bag half full of rotten apples is precisely the choice lawmakers are frequently faced with when voting on a "omnibus bill" – legislation that is a compilation of many separate bills.

U.S. Senator Jon Kyl

I have long argued that legislating with omnibus bills corrupts the legislative process, which was designed to ensure that individual bills could be carefully written, scrutinized, and amended. Bad bills can be opposed, good bills supported. With an omnibus package, good provisions are coupled together with bad ones, and legislators are forced into an “all or nothing” position.

And that was exactly the case when Congress recently approved the Omnibus Public Land Management Act, which was a catch-all legislative package that contained more than 160 different public land, water, and resource bills!

Among those 160 bills were pieces of legislation I authored or co-sponsored that directly benefit the state.

* The Lower Colorado River Multi-Species Conservation Program Act authorizes funding for the federal government’s share of a comprehensive effort among 50 federal and non-federal entities in Arizona, California, and Nevada to protect and maintain wildlife habitat along the Colorado River. It also provides assurance to the affected water and power agencies of the three states that their river operations may continue as long as they comply with the conservation program.

* The Sierra Vista Subwatershed Feasibility Study Act authorizes the Interior Secretary to study ways to add to the water supply in the Sierra Vista Subwatershed, which is home to Fort Huachuca, the San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area, and nearly 76,000 residents in southern Arizona.

* The Fossil Creek Wild and Scenic River Act adds 16.8 miles of Fossil Creek to the Scenic Rivers System.

* The Arizona National Scenic Trails Act adds 807 miles of trail from the Arizona-Mexico border to the Arizona-Utah border to the National Trails System.

* The Walnut Canyon Study directs the Secretaries of Interior and Agriculture to conduct a study of an area identified as the Walnut Canyon Proposed Study Area to assess the feasibility of designating all or part of the study area as an addition to the Walnut Canyon National Monument in the state.

But, as with every omnibus bill, these good provisions were coupled with bad ones.

For example, the bill establishes a national historic park in Paterson, New Jersey, despite objections in a 2006 National Park Service study that says the 40-acre area does not deserve federal funds because it already receives significant protection from the state (the study notes also that Niagara Falls has never been designated a national park because it is protected by New York).

The package also withdraws about 1.2 million acres of federal land in Wyoming from programs to develop natural resources, particularly mineral resources. According to Bureau of Land Management this provision takes 8.8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 300 million barrels of oil out of production.

Moreover, millions of taxpayer dollars in earmarks are tucked away in the package, including money for the 450th birthday celebration of St. Augustine, Florida; a study to determine whether Alexander Hamilton’s boyhood estate in St. Croix, Virgin Islands, should be designated as a new part of the National Park System; the maintenance of tropical botanical gardens in Hawaii and Florida; and a shipwreck exploration program.

In the end, I opposed the omnibus package because there simply were far too many bad bills. Indeed, in this case, more than just one bad apple spoiled the bunch. But it’s a good civics lesson. When you see how your representative voted, always get the whole story before deciding whether you agree or not. Sometimes it can be a bit complicated.

U.S. Senator Jon Kyl is the Assistant Republican Leader and serves on the Senate Finance and Judiciary committees. Visit his website here.