Old Hammurabi and enacting legislation

In " Men of Law", MacMillan and Co., William Segal writes "Hammurabi stereotyped a corpus of archaic law; but above all, he launched a great delusion which continued to exercise a spell over men of antiquity which still has not spent its force in modern times. It was the delusion that the weak could be protected against the force and cunning of the strong by means of the written word. Thereafter the people cried for the Ten Commandments, for Tablets of the Law, for Twelve Tablets, for laws engraved on wood and bronze and stone." The people are still crying for more laws, crying for programs, crying for pork, crying for regulation, de-regulation and re-regulation. They cry for laws on paper, laws on disks, and laws floating in cyberspace.

After 27 years of passing and killing bills, here is what I believe an advocate for a law or laws must think about and do.

The advocates must have a clear vision of what they want to accomplish.
The goal must be politically possible.
The advocate must communicate the goal to the leadership of both houses of the Legislature as early as possible.
The advocate must be able to frame the issue in terms easily understood by legislators.
You must plan the path of the bill.
You must recruit and educate your House and Senate authors.
You must carefully oversee drafting of the proposed legislation.
You must educate the committee chairs and members about the bill.
You must identify external forces (friends and enemies) that might affect your plan and be ready to respond to their actions
You must have a clear vision of what you want out of the process in the end, while extrnal forces and the Legislature itself work on your bill.
You must have alternative strategies to reach your goal in the event you are sidetracked or fail early in the legislative session.
You must be constantly available to educate members, detect problems, overcome road blocks and create opportunities.
You must have the time, the tools and commitment to "go the distance," an entire legisltive session.