OUTLINE: GITELSON CHAPTER 10
CONGRESS (5)
I)
Criteria for membership in: (p. 258)
A) Congress (p. 258)
1) Age = 30+ (p. 258)
2) Citizen for at least
9 years. (p. 258)
3) Be in state of
election, and district. (p. 258)
B) House of Representatives (p. 258)
1) Age = 25+ (p. 258)
2) 7
year citizenship. (p. 258)
3) Resident of state
elected. (p. 258)
II)
Typical Congress member: (p. 259)
A) Middle age, white male, previously
employed in high status job, highly educated. (p. 259)
B) Education: college. Majority have graduate/professional work. (p.
259)
C) Law, business, banking = common profession. (p. 259)
III)
Getting elected (p. 260)
A)
Incumbents did well in 1994.
(p. 260)
B)
While incumbents
do well, many members choose not to run for re-election. (p 261)
C)
House seats re-distributed every 10 years due to census. (p. 261)
D) Gerrymandering:
drawing district boundaries that help gain
political advantage = increases likelihood
of winning many
seats. Unconstitutional if boundaries are around minority causing them to be
political
majority, due to
race as main factor. (p. 261)
E)
Gerrymandering doesn’t always equal success in re-election. (p. 261)
F)
Well known candidates are viewed favorably, more than their less known
opponents. (p. 261)
G)
Franking privilege (p 262):
Congress can send out mail to advertise themselves,
free of
charge.
H)
"Credit claiming":
credit taken for benefit voters receive from national government,
Saying he was one responsible for progress achieved. (p. 262)
I) Pork-barrel
legislation (p. 262): allowing funds to go to
projects in Congress member's area.
J)
Home style: the way Congress
presents self to voter to earn voter's trust. (p. 262)
K)
Term limits passed by states,
but then declared unconstitutional later because it needed
to amend Constitution. (p. 262)
IV)
Work of Congress (p. 264)
A) Makes laws: (p. 264)
a) Enumerated
powers: are specific powers given to Congress by Constitution. In addition,
Constitution also has
a "necessary/proper
clause".
b) Necessary/proper
clause (p. 39): The powers given by this clause are not stated in
Constitution, but are
implied given powers.
The clause allows Congress the power to make laws to help them carry out tasks
that
ARE given by
the Constitution.
B) Taxing
power: (p. 264)
a) Tax bills originate in House, but
may be amended in Senate. (p. 264)
b) Tax Reform Act: reduced tax of
individuals. (p. 265)
C) Produce
Budget: to attempt to centralize budget, restrain overall spending. (p.
265)
a) Control
Act: created new budget committee in each house by Congressional
Budget Office (CBO) -> meaning Congress has expertise equal to
Executive.
Job of CBO: analyzes president budget and spending levels.
-CBO gave entitlements: payments automatically go to person of local
government
that meet requirement stated by law (For example: Social
Security benefits, pensions).
b) First
Concurrent Budget Resolution: spending
ceilings/limits in each major category. (p. 265)
Committees send info to House and Senate,
which must pass them both. (p. 265)
c)
Committees must follow spending guidelines set by budget resolution. (p. 265)
d)
Reconciliation (p. 265): If SPENDING
anticipation/guidelines exceeds budget, then it means -->
1) Appropriations/budget
must be reduced. (p. 265)
2) House AND
Congress agree to raise budget/allowance by amending original.
By reconciliation
process, the amending of the original budget must be done by the time second
budget resolution
is passed. This did not help reduce budget deficit. (p. 266)
3)
Passage of Gramm-Rudman-Hollings law: set series of deficit reducing targets to force
Congress to do something to reduce deficit. This law gave Congress the threat of sequestration,
which was a threat to withhold funds. (p. 266)
4) Sequestration was avoided by passage of Budget Enforcement Act: gave more
flexible deficit
targets. Act divides targets in 3 types (defense, domestic,
international),
allowing one type to cap the spending of the others. (p. 266)
D) Casework
(p. 267): Congress members expected to
help fellow citizens through federal
programs.
Helping them through personal services (such as helping citizen through
a problem of getting a social security
check etc.) Congress members complain that
doing casework decreases time in making policies.
E) Congressional oversight: responsible
for overseeing activities of
executive agencies
that are supposed to be implementing the
policies. Bring a weakness to the attention
of the Congress member. Let them know their
work is being watched, critiqued.
Investigate/ compel testimony if needed. (p. 267)
F)
Legislative veto (p.
268): Congress or its committee vetoes president or executive agency's
actions covered by bill. Executive can make
specific policies but they have to be
approved by Congress. Was declared unconstitutional,
but this veto is still currently used.
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Table: Powers Of Congress |
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|
US House of
Representatives |
US Senate |
|
1) Starts tax
bills. 2) Starts
initiating spending bills. 3) Impeaches
President, federal judges, justices. |
1) Confirms
appointment of President. 2) Ratifies treaties. 3) Holds trial
for people impeached. |
|
Both Acting
Together: 1) Pass bills. 2) Declare war. 3) Makes
amendments. 4)
Does caseworks. |
|
V)
Organization of Congress (p. 269)
A) Bicameral:
2 separate houses with near equal power.
Divides power, balances states. (p. 268-269)
a) Created to represent
different elements in American society. (p. 269)
1) Representatives:
represent public opinion via many, popular elections. (p. 269)
2) Senate
curbs radical tendencies, cools down place. Chosen by
electorate. (p. 269)
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TABLE 2:
UNITED STATES CONGRESS |
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|
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Term:
2 years Serves:
Congressional district (CD) |
Term: 6 years Serves: state |
B) Congressional leadership: party
leadership, parties that organize Congress. (p. 270)
a)
Speaker of House: Most
powerful in Congress, the HIGHEST leader. (p. 270)
1) Only
house position created by Constitution. (p. 270)
2) Leader of
majority party (chosen by their
vote). (p. 270)
3) Presides
over house. (p. 270)
4) Second in line to President. (p. 270)
b) Majority leader:
Second ranking party position. First ranking in Senate. (p 271)
1) Schedules
floor actions on bills, chairs committees. (p. 271)
2) Guides
party legislative program through House. (p. 271)
3) Succeeds
speaker. (p. 271)
c) Minority
leader: head of Senate's
minority party. Opposite of majority party. (p. 271)
d) Party
whips: helps majority/minority
leaders. Communicates information to party. Keeps
leaders informed of member views. (p. 271)
e) Senate leadership: Vice-President.
President of senate as stated in Constitution. Ceremonial: votes only to
break a tie. (p. 271)
C) Committee system: Bills
recommended for action are referred as the “congressional
agenda”. (p. 271)
a) Types of committees (p. 272):
1) Standing
committees: MOST important.
Permanent. Considers
legislation in specific areas and decides whether they should be
recommended to pass to larger body. Nearly all legislation is sent here.
Used to have subcommittees. (p. 272)
2) Select/special(ad hoc)
committees: temporary. Created by House or Senate to
study specific problems. (p. 272)
3) Joint
committees: 4 committees. Congressional. Equal number of members
from each house. (p. 272)
4) Conference
committees: temporary joint. To reconcile differences
between House and Senate bills. "3rd house of Congress".
Shapes
legislation because bills must be passed by
both houses. (p. 272)
b) Size/Membership: (p.
272)
1) Can be
adjusted from session to session. (p. 272)
2) Majority-minority ratio causes more
trouble. Number reflects strength of each
party. (p. 272)
c) Committee
leadership: (p. 274)
1) Parties organize Congress, chairs
always members of majority. (p. 274)
2) Seniority
rule: member of majority party who served the longest, uncut
time in office is the chair. (p. 274)
D) Nonofficial groups: (p. 274-275)
a) Democratic
Study Group (DSG): helped enhance power of Democratic
officials. (p. 274)
b) Used to compensate for fragmentation of Congress produced by
committee system, but
made things worse by: increasing House decentralization and single issue
politics importance. (p. 274)
c) Caucuses (are meetings) that work on policy questions, gather
resources. (p. 275)
E) Congressional staff: 11000+
people: Does casework, legislative work
as well.
Further decentralizes government. (p. 275)
VI)
How a Bill Becomes Law (p. 276-277)
A) Member of Congress introduces
legislation/law. (Office to Legislative Counsel of each
House helps draft it.) Bills may be drafted by other means. (p. 276-277)
a) Proposal dropped in
"hopper" box. (p. 276-277)
b) Senators hand them to
clerk to publish in Congressional record. (p. 276-277)
c) Bill numbered by
introduction. (p. 276-277)
d) Sent to government
printing office. (p. 276-277)
1) HR=House introduced
it. (p. 276-277)
2) S=Senate.
(p. 276-277)
B) Committee considers it after is
referred. (p. 278)
a) Committees other than the one
concerning bill may be chosen to look over it. (p. 278)
b) Subcommittee has jurisdiction over bill. (p. 278)
c) If hearings decided,
testifying allowed. (p. 278)
d) Markup
session: subcommittee votes to amend
bill and settles on its precise
language. Committee may make new version of it. If bill reported, its
approved,
placed on calendar = whole body(House/Senate) will then consider
it. (p. 278)
C) Floor action: (p. 278-279)
1) House: Rules Committee determines the schedule of when controversial bills
are to be debated. (Controversial bills are bills that are not
unanimous, or will
spend public funds). Rules
Committee action must be in a resolution approved
on House floor before bill consideration. (p. 278-279)
a) Democratic-sponsored
rule: House votes on individual spending cuts
separately. Republicans thought that separating popular social
programs would prevent it from being voted off. (p. 278-279)
b) Debate time: 1-10 hours depending on
complexity. (p. 278-279)
2) Senate: Has smaller, more casual
procedures. If bill scheduled, it comes off and
talked about. Unlimited debate. (p. 278-279)
a) Filibuster
(p. 279): prolonged debate designed to kill bill by preventing a vote to
happen. Filibuster can be busted by ->
b) Cloture: rule to end the senate
debate by: vote of at >60 senators. (p. 279)
D) Conference work: Bill sent to
president after passed by both houses. If last house makes little
changes,
bill goes to original house for approval. Big changes/alterations = committee
conference
to go
over bill. If agreement not reached, bill dies. Bill is accepted more often
than not. (p. 279-280)