response-po5
Response one pol-05
Based on the look of the present Congress it appears that there are at least 42 different committees. While some of these committees appear to be unique to either the House or the Senate there are overlapping committees such as the Armed Services, Budget and Intelligence committees. Although, Congressional committees are headed by the party that is currently in power of that respective house. In the current case, the Republican Party controls both and the majority on the committees is Republican (Congressional Committees). By having all committees controlled by the same party tends to lead to lesser independence for Congressional committees. The party polarization that exist in present day politics and is evident in the composition of Congress also tends lead to Congressional committees want to pass legislation onto either the House or the Senate that benefits the ideals of the party in power. To get a better understanding of the lesser independence when one party controls Congress we can look simple at the fact that the number of constitutional hearings is less during a unified Congress than when they are divided. For example, when the House has been unified between the years of 1970 to 2009 there have been on average two less constitutional hearing (Devins 2011).
Additionally, while there was a change in the 1970s that resulted in reforms of the committees and provided more power to the chairs and leaders of the political parties it affected how policy could passed through Congressional committees. The creation of lesser independence due to the increased party polarization has led to a system where when a major controls both policy that is designed to benefit a certain group may or may not be passed based on party affiliation (Pearson 2009).
By seeing the affects that party polarization has had on Congressional committees it would almost appear that having greater independence with the committees could potential lead to policies and bills that benefit a larger group being passed onto the Congressional floors. Furthermore, the redundancy of committees in both the House and Senate seem to prevent greater independence. This could primarily be to blame when one party controls all of Congress. An example this could be the House Appropriations committee seeking to allocate funds for the Department of Defense and based on the control the House at this time the committee is going to be heavily influenced by that party. Then, if the same party controls the Senate Appropriations committee the ideas of the less party in getting appropriations set aside that could either benefit or hinder the Department of Defense are ignored. Having greater independence and not having that specific influence from party polarization would generate better discussion and the potential for appropriations being allocated that are more potentially beneficial than not.
References:
Devins, Neal. 2011. “PARTY POLARIZATION AND CONGRESSIONAL COMMITTEE CONSIDERATION OF CONSTITUTIONAL QUESTIONS.” Northwestern University Law Review 105, no. 2: 737-787. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed September 8, 2017).
Congressional Committees.” GovTrack.us. Accessed September 08, 2017. https://www.govtrack.us/congress/committees/
Committee System, 1929-76.” Journal Of Politics 71, no. 4: 1238-1256. Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost (accessed September 8, 2017).
Response two-pol-05
This week’s discussion is based around the make-up and responsibilities of Congressional committees. There are several committees in each sides of Congress and each committee has distinct roles and responsibilities. For example, The Way and Means Committee in The House of Representatives are responsible for all legislation surrounding taxation and spending (Grulke, 2018). It was reviewed that legislation in Congress starts within the various committees in The House and The Senate before any Bill makes it way to the floor for a vote. This makes the process for passing any type of legislation a rigorous process. To add to that, the power the majority party has in Congress is tremendous. The majority party selects the Chairs of the committees, sets the committee’s agenda, and controls other aspects as well. Due to this amount power, typically the American people hold the majority party responsible for the successes or failures within Congress (Jones, 2012). To highlight just how important Committees are within Congress, I would like to give a brief review of how legislation travels through Congress before making it to the President’s desk.
First, it should be noted that a proposed law can start in either the House or the Senate, with the exception of those laws pertaining to money. A quick example of the process under the premise the new legislation is altering the tax code. The first steps of passing new legislation are by having a Congressman or Congresswoman, or group of them, introduce (sponsor) the new legislation and it being assigned to a committee for debate, in this example the Ways and Means Committee (Legislative, 2018). If the proposed legislation makes it out of the committee debate, then the proposed legislation moves onto the floor within with The House of Representatives. If the proposed legislation obtains a simple majority, it then moves onto the Senate where it is once again assigned to a committee within the Senate for debate. Once the Senate Committee agrees to bring it out of Committee, the new bill is voted on the floor. At that point a simple majority is typically required unless the filibuster is invoked where the bill requires at least 60 votes (Grulke, 2018). If the Senate passes the proposed bill, in then travels to the Conference Committee which is made up of both the House and the Senate to work out any differences the two versions of the Bill has. Once the Conference Committee has the differences worked out, both the House and Senate vote on the new version (Legislative, 2018). The President then has ten days to either sign it or veto it. If the President decides to not act upon the proposed legislation within ten days, it automatically is the new law.
As one can see, three committees were used in this simple example. Any one of them could have come to conclusion that it is not feasible, needed alterations, or refused to debate. This type of independence these three committees have ensured that any proposed legislation goes through a tough vetting process. On the flip side, the rigorous process can also slow progress, sometimes intentionally if Party politics are in play. If the House is Republican and the Senate is Democrat, either Party could derail efforts of the other. This is some of the actions we have been seeing in the past ten years or so. The Congress has seemed to forget how to compromise, but instead uses threats to shut down the government or use the “nuclear option” to pass legislation….
References
Grulke, Eric, “Week 5: Congressional Committees”, American Military University,
Jones, David R., and Monika L. McDermott. “The Responsible Party Government
Model in House and Senate Elections.” American Journal of Political Science 48, no. 1 (2004): 1-12. doi:10.2307/1519893.
“The Legislative Process.” U.S. House of Representatives. Accessed February 1,
2018. https://www.house.gov/the-house-explained/the-legislative-process.
Committees have been in existence since the emergence of our country. They expanded and contracted depending on the needs of the legislative bodies. After FDR, expanded executive power tremendously, congress thought that many of the committees that had formed, had overlapping duties and not enough staff to perform their job duties. This rendered the committees ineffective to perform the original intent of having them formulating policies. Congress, in 1945, then “created the first Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress.”[1]
What came out of this reorganization was the following:
· Congress passed “the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1946”[2]
· The Senate’s 33 committees were scaled down to 15
· The House’s 48 committees were scaled down to 19
· Committees were combined
· Several standing committees were converted to into subcommittees
· Rules were established for the committees
· Jurisdictions were laid out in writing
· Hearings were now open to the public[3]
The problem with this reorganization, like many things in life, there were unintended consequences. The Act of 1946 did not address or limit the number of subcommittees that could be formed. Welsh tells us that subcommittees grew to 145 in the House and 120 in the Senate, by 1975. This gave more power to the subcommittees. In the mid 1960’s, congress set about to rework committees again. A “second Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress” was put together for the purpose of hiring SME’s (subject matter experts), specifically employees with technical and scientific backgrounds.[4]
According to Davidson, there are but two purposes of committees. They are individual and institutional. As an individual, each committee member is actually beholden to his constituents by virtue of the fact that they voted for him. So, what the individual member of congress does is look to see what perks, projects or “pork” he can bring home to his district. One of the benefits to the individual lawmaker is that he can learn so much about the subject matter of his committee.[5]
As an institution, committees do the following:
· Make policy
· Oversee federal agencies
· Hold hearings to keep the public informed[6]
One thing that I thought was interesting is that as an institution, committees divide themselves up into “little legislatures.”[7] The benefit of that is that each “little legislature” can work on prospective legislation at the same time.
Why is that important? As of the 2010, committees made up of “100 senators and 441 house members could not handle roughly, 10,000 bills and nearly 100,000 nominations biennially,”[8] and a staggering national budget.[9] Whew, this boggles the mind.
Next, is an explanation of how committees were formed. I found this to be fascinating. Both in the House and the Senate, the parties “are organized into the same three components: caucuses, committees and informal party groups.”[10] Leaders for these groups are elected by party conferences or caucuses. They also do the following: “approve committee assignments, provide members with services, debate party and legislative rules and policies, appoint task forces or issue teams, develop themes to keep members on message, enable members to vent their frustrations, (I thought this was interesting) and discuss outreach programs that appeal to voters.”[11]
The purpose of party caucuses according to Davidson is to create unity within the party. In rare instances, committee leaders have their seniority taken away or to remove someone from party leadership. As an example, Joe Lieberman who was an Independent from Connecticut, was relieved of his membership of the Environment and Public Works committee because he supported McCain for president. When members are indicted, they are removed from their posts as well.[12]
I added the following chart because it was easier for me to visualize what the committees’ responsibilities are. The purpose of the four congressional parties listed in the chart below are to establish the specific committee.
Party Committees in the Senate and the House as of 2010
Davidson posits that the influence of these party committees has been a roller coaster ride. That their influence is greater when that party is in the minority and “does not control the White House.”[14] As an example, during George W. Bush’s eight-year time in the White House, the “chair of the Senate Democratic Policy Committee”[15] Byron Dorgan, instructed his committees to perform such oversight as to be considered substantial over the Afghanistan and Iraq contracts and the prescription drug enactment for Medicare recipients.
The House and Senate committees are where the real work of congress takes place.[16] If committees have an overabundance of rules, that puts a stranglehold on their efforts. If committees have too few rules, then they can run amok, at taxpayers’ expense. Having said that and based on the research I have done, committees need a certain amount of independence to be able to do the research necessary to formulate policy, make sure proposed legislation passes constitutional muster and provides for the safety and security for all Americans.
Trish
Bibliography:
Davidson, Roger, Oleszek, Walter, and Lee, Frances, Congress and Its Members, 12th ed., (Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, a division of Sage, 2009).
Welsh, Michael, Sweet, Ellen, and McKinney, Richard, “An Overview of the Development of U.S. Congressional Committees,” revised from the version first published as a two-part article in LAW LIBRARY LIGHTS, Vol. 47, nos. 3 & 4, Spring and Summer, 2004, Law Librarians’ Society of Washington, D.C., Inc. (http://www.llsdc.org/). (July 2008): 1-21. http://www.llsdc.org/assets/sourcebook/cong-cmte-overview.pdf (accessed January 31, 2018).
Wilson, James Q. and Dilulio, John J. Jr., “American Government, Institutions and Policies”, Ninth Ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2004.
[1] Welsh, Michael, Sweet, Ellen, and McKinney, Richard, “An Overview of the Development of U.S. Congressional Committees,” revised from the version first published as a two-part article in LAW LIBRARY LIGHTS, Vol. 47, nos. 3 & 4, Spring and Summer, 2004, Law Librarians’ Society of Washington, D.C., Inc. (http://www.llsdc.org/). (July 2008): 1-21. http://www.llsdc.org/assets/sourcebook/cong-cmte-overview.pdf (accessed January 31, 2018), 7.
[5] Roger Davidson, Walter Oleszek, and Frances Lee, Congress and Its Members, 12th ed., (Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, a division of Sage, 2009), 199.
[16] James Q. Wilson, and John J. Dilulio, Jr., “American Government, Institutions and Policies”, Ninth Ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2004, 304.
