Biennial legislative sessions are regular meetings of a state legislature held once every two years rather than every year. Four states still work this way: Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, and Texas, all of which convene in odd-numbered years.1National Conference of State Legislatures. Inside the Legislative Process – Legislative Sessions In practice, the model means a tightly capped session calendar, a two-year budget passed in one shot, interim committees doing the groundwork during the off year, and special sessions when something can’t wait.
The Four States That Still Meet Every Two Years
Biennial sessions used to be the norm. In the early 1960s, 31 state legislatures met only every other year. By the mid-1970s that number had fallen to about nine, and it has kept shrinking. Arkansas voters approved a switch to annual sessions in 2008, and Oregon followed in 2010. Kentucky, New Hampshire, and Washington made the change earlier, holding their first annual sessions in 2001, 1985, and 1981.1National Conference of State Legislatures. Inside the Legislative Process – Legislative Sessions2MultiState. The Modernization of State Legislatures (is North Dakota Next?)
Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, and Texas are what’s left. Each writes the biennial schedule into its state constitution, which is why the number changes so slowly.
How Long the Sessions Last
Every biennial state caps the length of its regular session, and the caps differ:
- North Dakota: 80 natural days per biennium.3North Dakota Legislative Branch. Learn More About the Biennium Cycle
- Montana: 60 legislative days, with the option for a sitting legislature to vote to extend the limit for a future session.4Montana Judicial Branch. The Constitution of the State of Montana
- Nevada: 120 calendar days.5Nevada Legislature. Fact Sheet – Commencement and Length of Sessions
- Texas: 140 calendar days.6State of Texas. Texas Constitution Article III
The unit matters. A legislative day only counts when at least one chamber is formally in session, so Montana can spread its 60 days across several calendar months by taking breaks. Calendar-day limits, like those in Texas and Nevada, run continuously from the start date whether the legislature is meeting or not.
Because the clock is always running, biennial legislatures work to a strict internal timetable: an early window for filing bills and referring them to committees, a middle stretch for hearings and debate, and a final push for floor votes and reconciling differences between the chambers. Miss a deadline and the bill usually dies, with no chance to revive it until the legislature reconvenes two years later. That pressure drives a lot of negotiation into private conversations before bills ever surface publicly.
What the Legislature Does Between Sessions
The two-year gap doesn’t sit empty. Interim committees carry the work forward, studying issues, taking public testimony, and preparing legislation so lawmakers arrive at the next session with material ready to move.
During each regular session, legislators identify subjects that need deeper study and appoint interim committees to handle them. The committees usually draw members from both chambers, chosen for expertise or interest in the topic. Subjects range across budget, infrastructure, healthcare, and environmental policy. Committees hold hearings, consult outside experts, and work through data that would be hard to digest inside a compressed regular session.
The output is concrete. Staff prepare draft reports, and the committee can direct staff to produce findings, recommendations, and actual draft legislation. In Montana, the committee must approve its final report, findings, and any proposed bills by a September 15 deadline ahead of the next regular session.7Montana State Legislature. 2025-2026 Interim Services Available This pipeline is what makes a short biennial session workable. Without it, lawmakers would spend most of their limited days identifying problems rather than voting on solutions.
The Two-Year Budget
Because the legislature isn’t coming back for another two years, it has to appropriate money to cover the whole period in one package. All four biennial-session states enact two-year budgets. They aren’t the only ones: roughly 15 states in total adopted biennial budgets for fiscal years 2026 and 2027, including annual-session states like Ohio, Wisconsin, and Minnesota.8National Association of State Budget Officers. Proposed and Enacted Budgets
The trouble with a two-year budget is that economic conditions can shift after the legislature adjourns. Revenue projections made 18 months out can miss by billions if a recession hits or a major industry contracts. States handle this in different ways. Some build larger reserves to absorb shortfalls. Virginia schedules a mid-biennium legislative session specifically to revise the existing two-year budget.9National Association of State Budget Officers. States Finalize Fiscal 2026 Budgets Amid Tightening Conditions When no legislative fix is available, the governor and executive agencies manage shortfalls through spending controls and transfers between accounts.
Critics of biennial budgeting point out that agencies begin drafting their requests as far as 28 months before the second year of the cycle even begins, which makes the numbers stale by the time they matter most.10Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Biennial Budgeting: Do the Drawbacks Outweigh the Advantages? Supporters counter that a two-year horizon encourages more deliberate planning and leaves more legislative time for oversight instead of annual budget fights.
Special Sessions Between Regular Meetings
Emergencies don’t wait. When something urgent comes up between biennial sessions, a special session brings lawmakers back to the capitol. Natural disasters, budget crises, redistricting deadlines, and public health emergencies are common triggers.
Who can call one depends on the state. In 13 states, including Texas and North Dakota, only the governor can. In the other 37 states the legislature can also call itself into session, though that generally requires a two-thirds vote in both chambers.11National Conference of State Legislatures. Special Sessions Montana’s constitution sets a lower bar, allowing a special session at the written request of a majority of members.4Montana Judicial Branch. The Constitution of the State of Montana
Scope is usually restricted. When the governor calls a special session, the proclamation defines which topics the legislature may take up, and lawmakers generally cannot introduce unrelated bills. That keeps the session focused, but it can also become a political fight when legislators want to address issues the governor left out of the call. Special sessions carry real costs too: per diem for members, staff overtime, travel, and facility operations.
Why Some States Keep Them and Others Left
The trend line clearly favors annual sessions, but the four holdouts have arguments on their side. Defenders say a compressed calendar forces legislators to focus on genuinely important bills rather than churning out legislation for political messaging, and the off year gives part-time lawmakers time in their home districts and in the jobs that pay them. Biennial budgeting can encourage longer-range planning.
The strongest argument against is reduced responsiveness. A legislature that meets every two years cannot react quickly to economic downturns, public health crises, or shifts in federal policy. Budget projections become less reliable over a two-year window. When conditions change sharply, the state has to call an expensive special session or wait. Critics also argue that concentrating decisions into a short window advantages well-organized interest groups over ordinary residents who can’t engage intensively during a compressed timeline.10Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Biennial Budgeting: Do the Drawbacks Outweigh the Advantages?
How a State Changes Its Session Schedule
Because session frequency sits in the state constitution, switching from biennial to annual isn’t a matter of ordinary legislation. It takes a constitutional amendment, which generally means the legislature proposes the change and voters ratify it at the ballot. Some states also require the amendment to pass in two consecutive legislative sessions before it goes to voters.12The Book of the States. Constitutional Amendment Procedure: By the Legislature, Constitutional Provisions
That’s the route Arkansas and Oregon used, in 2008 and 2010 respectively.2MultiState. The Modernization of State Legislatures (is North Dakota Next?) North Dakota has seen proposals to switch surface more than once without success, which is a reminder that voters in biennial states often place real weight on the tradition of limited session time even as the workload on state government grows.