For almost a year now, Congress has been acting favorably on many of the issues important to independent insurance agencies. The question is, how long will this last?

The list of legislative victories to this point has been impressive. Some of the wins include the following:

• In January of 2015, Congress voted overwhelmingly to renew the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act and created the National Association of Registered Agents and Brokers.
• A bipartisan bill, the Protecting Affordable Coverage for Employers Act, which enables the states, as the regulators of insurance, to keep the current definition of a "small group market" in health insurance at 50 or fewer employees was passed and became law in October 2015.
• The Policyholder Protection Act was introduced. It prohibits federal regulators from using assets designated to pay out insurance claims to "prop up" an affiliated bank.
• A nationwide grassroots campaign by crop insurance agents and their allies induced Congress to reverse a planned $3 billion cut to the federal crop insurance program.
• A two-year delay of the "Cadillac Tax," a 40% tax on certain employer-based health plans, was included in the year-end "omnibus" appropriations funding measure.

While this independent agency winning streak was being compiled, something else was mercifully absent: attempts to enact measures that would lead to a federal takeover of insurance regulation from the states.

You will recall that it was just a few years ago when a handful of lawmakers from both parties were aggressively pushing such proposals as an optional federal charter for insurers and producers, which they said would be the first step toward federal insurance regulation.