Notesale: Turn your study into money

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Structure:
House
435 (by population)
Entire house every 2 years

Senate
Membership
100 (2 a state)
Terms of office
One third every 2 years; all
members every 6 years
Qualifications
25yrs+; 7yrs citizen, in state
30yrs+; 9yrs citizen, in state
Constituencies
Smaller by districts
Larger, entire state
Prestige
Less
More
- Women are under represented: 2016 83 in house (19%); 21 in senate (21%)
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Powers:
Law-making:
- Congress has only those powers outlined in Article I of Constitution; limited government
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- But, Constitution grants House with law making power to begin considering money bills (tax bills)
because House was originally the only directly elected chamber; but no as significant as requires
Senate’s cooperation and amendment
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This occurs almost exclusively in committee rooms, exercised by
congressional standing and select committees
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Confirming appointments:
- Constitution grants Senate alone power to confirm, by simple majority, President’s appointments
to federal judiciary and many of executive branch; 2010 Justice John Paul Stevens retired,
Senate confirmed by 63-37 votes Obama’s nominee Elena Kagan; 2013 Hillary Clinton Secretary
of State resigned, Obama gained Senate’s approval to appoint John Kerry by 94-3 votes; 2018
Trump’s appointment of General Counsel of Defence Paul Ney Jnr confirmed by 70-23 Senate
vote; 2019 Trump’s appointment of Attorney General William Barr confirmed by 54-45 Senate
vote; 2019 Secretary of Labour Eugene Scalia by 53-44 vote; 2018 Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo by 57-42
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Ratifying treaties:
- Senate’s sole power to ratify treaties by 2/3 majority; president must keep senate fully informed
of negotiations to avoid disapproval in ratification stage; 2010 Obama and Medvedev’s START
(strategic arms reduction) ratified by 71-26 votes; 2018 Extradition Treaty with R of Kosovo
replacing previous 1901 Treaty, agreed by Division Vote
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Impeaching and removing public officials:

Outlined in Article II Section 4, granting Congress the power to impeach and remove “all civil
Officers of the United States” for “Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanours”
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House initiated 62 impeachments since
1789 but only 19 passed to a Senate trial; e
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g
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1972 Nixon avoided impeachment as he resigned following
the Watergate Scandal; 1968 Associate Justice Abe Fortas resigned from Supreme Court to
avoid impeachment; e
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2019 Trump impeached as a result of whistleblower complaint which
brought the Trump-Ukraine Scandal to public attention – on abuse of power and obstruction of
Congress – Senate trial yet to happen
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g
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- Members of Congress cannot be impeached and removed in this way because every they are
representatives of the people, but under Article I, Section 5 each chamber may expel someone
for “disorderly behaviour” by 2/3 vote; e
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expulsion by House of Democrat James Traficant of
Ohio after convictions of bribery and filing false tax returns
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g
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Declaring war:
- Both houses must concur war: 1941 WW2 on Japan; since then its become Presidential
warmaking: Korea, Vietnam, Iraq; mostly undeclared war just military combat authorised by
Congress but indirect act of war or missile strikes etc
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Comparing the House and Senate:
Joint powers of both Houses:
- Law making
- Oversight of executive
- Overriding President veto
- Initiating constitutional amendments
- Impeaching and removing public officials
- Confirming Vice President
- Declaring war
- If Electoral College deadlocked, election President and Vice President
Sole powers of Senate:
- Confirming appointments
- Ratifying treaties
Sole powers of the House:
- Beginning consideration of money bills
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Whilst Congressmen represent districts, Senators represent entire state; e
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Representative
Henry Cuellar represent 28th Congressional District of Texas, Senator John Cornyn represents
entirety of Texas
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Senate is launching pad for presidential campaign: Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Obama
were all former Senators; 2016 Presidential campaign saw 5 Senators (Republicans Ted Cruz,
Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, Lindsey Graham and Democrat Bernie Sanders) and 3 former
Senators (Republican Rick Santorum, Democrats Hillary Clinton and Jim Webb) and 4 Vice
Presidents current or former Senators (Walter Mondale, Dan Quayle, Al Gore and Joe Biden);
Democrat Senators Michael Bennet, Joe Biden Jnr, Amy Klobachar, Bernie Sanders and
Elizabeth Warren all running for 2020 Presidential election
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Senate is more prestigious than House:
- Represent entire state
- Serve longer terms
- Are fewer in number (100 v 435)
- More likely to chair a Committee or sub-committee or hold leadership positions
- Recruiting pool for for presidential and vice-presidential candidates
- Possess significant exclusive powers
- House members frequently seek election to Senate, not vice versa
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Legislation and scrutiny of executive branch (joint)
Begin confirmation of appointments (Senate only)
Exist in both Houses; permanent policy-specialist committees; most are divided in subcommittees; typical senate standing committees comprised of 18 members whilst House
standing committees comprised of 30-40 members; party a lance is in proportion to that which
exists within chamber as a whole; January 2017 115th Congress, Republicans were majority
party in both Houses thus congressional standing committees had Republican majorities
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g
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Dakota’s Senators, Republican John Hoeven and
Democrat Heidi Heitkamp are members of the Senate Agriculture Committee; re-elected
member s are routinely reappointed to their former committees unless they have asked for a new
assignment; some committees (e
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Judiciary Armed Services and Appropriation) are more
prestigious than others; new members might have to wait some years to get assigned to these
more sought-after committees
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- Examples of House standing committees include Armed Services and Foreign Affairs
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Functions of standing committees:
- Conducting the committee stage of bills:

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This involves holding hearings on the bill at which witnesses appear; this might include
other members of Congress, members from the relevant executive departments or
agencies even from the White House, representatives from interest groups or professional
bodies likely to be affected, and ordinary members of the public
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But long
controversial bills are given hearings that might last for weeks or even months; at the
conclusion of these hearings, a vote is taken by the committee on whether or not to pass
the bill on to the full chamber for debate and votes, the next stage of legislation
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• Judiciary committee holds hearings on all federal judicial appointments made by
President; e
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2016 Obama’s Supreme Court nominee Judge Merrick Garland
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• Hearings held at which supporters, and critics, of the nominee are heard from before vote
taken; vote isn’t decisive but recommendatory but its very important Claude to the likely
outcome; because these committees are regarded as the policy specialists in their
particular areas, their recommendations are rarely overturned
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House Rules Committee:
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Timetabling legislation in House
Responsible for prioritising bills coming from committee stage on to House floor for debate and
votes; has vital legislative role to play because there is a judge queue of bills waiting to be
considered on House Floor; derives name from rule given to bills which sets out the rules to
debating and whether or not amendments can be made
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• Closed rules that forbid any amendments
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Conference committees:
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Reconciling differences in legislation (joint)
Required because of two important characteristics of the congressional legislative process: both
houses have equal power and that bills pass through both houses concurrently instead of
consecutively like the UK; there is therefore a House version fo the bill and a Senate’s which are

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very likely to be different and if these differences cannot be reconciled informally, a conference
committee is set up and are ad hoc for each articulate bill
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Important because they are likely to draw up what the final bill will look like; but power is checked
by ability of Houses to refuse to sign up their compromise version
Much less frequently used nowadays as there have been new ways of solving differences over
bills
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Select committees form when investigation does not fall within policy area of a standing
committee or too important for one standing committee to leave its work and focus entirely on it
so needs its own investigative body
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There are though a number of few select committees: 1 in House on Intelligence; 4 in Senate on
Ageing, Ethics, Indian Affairs and Intelligence
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But Republicans in House and Senate have amended seniority rule by adopting term limits for
chairs when they are in the majority; Republicans in both houses now have a three-term limit (6
years) as committee chairs; when in majority House Republicans use their leadership-dominated
Steering Committee to play key rile in determining who will become committee chair instead of
relying on seniority
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Chairing a Congressional Committee brings power, perks, publicity and could be the pinnacle of
their congressional career
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Bills pass through both houses concurrently
A Congress lasts for 2 years and any bills that have not completed the legislative process at the
end of a Congress must start from the beginning of the process in a new Congress
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5% – will successfully pass to become laws during a Congress
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- There is little party discipline in Congress and the President is less likely to have control over
both houses – this increases the difficulty and uncertainty in the process
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First reading (introduction)
2
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Timetabling
4
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Third reading
6
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Presidential action
All bills must pass through 1-5 and 7 to be successful, and this must all happen within one Congress/
two years
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Stage 6 may be avoided if both houses pass the bill in the same
form or if any differences are resolved amicably
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The first reading:
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A pure formality to introduce the bill; no debate or vote
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In the Senate, the title of the bill is read out on the floor
Bills are then numbered, printed, circulated, and sent to the appropriate standing committee
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The process helps explain why this percentage is so small
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3% of bills introduced; 2013-14 113th Congress 2
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7%
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The committee process:
a
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- They debate whether they agree in principle with a bill and then, if they support its overall
purpose, examine the detailed provisions to ensure it will effectively achieve its aims
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g
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Hearings can be in a full or sub committee and can last from days to months,
depending on how controversial
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- Also important as this stage is so early on in the process: before the second reading, and full
House and Senate debates (unlike UK); therefore very important in shaping the basic format of
any bill
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Professor Vile calls them “the
sieve through which all legislation is poured” (1999)
- Any amendments designed to benefit a member’s constituency directly are known as earmarks;
when a bill us substantially amended by many members this way, the process is referred to as
pork-barrel politics; making reciprocal deals to support each other’s earmarks is called log-rolling
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- Reporting out: states main aims; reviews committee’s amendments; estimates cost of
implementation; recommends future action to be taken by the full chamber
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Pigeonholing:
- Hundreds of bills referred to each standing committee so some are ignored completely –
pigeonholed – therefore bill is killed as no further action is taken towards it; traditionally not done
for presidential proposals or bills popular amongst Congress or interest groups
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Personal considerations: chairperson may block bill proposed by someone they dislike,
possibly as a result of past political battle
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3
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If committee decides to debate the bill under the closed
rule, no further amendments can be made; under open rule means bill provisions can be radically
altered during second reading
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Senate deals with this through unanimous consent agreements between majority and minority
leaders on order of bill debate
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The second reading:
a
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- Can either use voice vote (aye/no) or recorded vote (electronically in House; alphabetical order
in Senate)
- In House, second reading takes place in Committee of the Whole House, which allows as many
members as possible to take part in debate; when session ends, simple majority required to
successfully negotiate bill in House
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Filibusters:
- These can take place in Senate when an individual or group of Senators can try to talk bill to
death using delaying tactics; this stops progress of bill by keeping debate going and stopping
vote from being called
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- Procedure for ending one is ‘closure’, must be signed by 16 senators, supported by 60 votes;
means bill is not assured of passing the Senate even if it has major Senate support (50+); e
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November 2013 Senate Democrat leaders voted to restrict the use of increasingly excessive
filibustering, reducing closure vote to simple-majority on nomination debates and later passed
the nuclear option: a simple-majority vote to end filibusters against executive and judicial
appointments, excluding Supreme Court nominees; after 2015, Republicans maintained these
reforms then 2017 banned filibustering of Supreme Court nominees to secure appointment of
Neil Gorsuch to Court
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5
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6
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But frequently avoided now, instead, majority party leadership resolves differences; 2013-14
113th Congress only 2 bills passed to conference committees; this began following 1995
Republican control of both Houses of Congress; began using more ad-hoc leadership driven
approach; called ping-ponging (sending bills back-and-forth between Houses); Gretzky reduced
minority party member input and increases partisanship; continued when Democrats regained
majority 2007
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Dakota: “very important that conferences occur…very good
process…getting away from that…is unhealthy”
Republican Michael Crapo Idaho: “ping-ponging make mistakes…a fait accompli…makes for a
much less worthy product”
Conference committee avoided for 2008 Bush $700 billion financial industry bailout and 2009
Obamacare
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Presidential action:
1
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g
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Can also be signed for political expediency, e
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the Campaign Finance
Reform Bill signed by Bush Jnr in March 2002; signing is usually done within 10 Congressional
working days of receipt of the bill from Congress
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‘Leave the bill on his desk’: done with bills upon which he partly supports or takes not position
at all, or which he would like to veto but knows will be overridden; these become law without his
signature within 10 Congressional working days
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Regular veto: for bills he strongly opposes; can threaten to do to veto to persuade Congress to
make his changes; must veto within 10 congressional workdays of receipt and send back with
explanation; must veto whole bill not parts of it
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Pocket veto: if congressional session to end within the time frame, President can pocket bill
until time runs out and Congress closes; e
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December 2008 Bush Jnr vetoed National Defence
Authorisation Bill
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Line-item veto: gave President more power by vetoing parts of bill and approve others; mid1990s Clinton followed this, striking out 82 items from legislation; until Supreme Court declared
this unconstitutional in Clinton v New York City; since then, proposed as possible constitutional
amendment
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Right the wrongs identified in veto and return bill for signature (unlikely)
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Attempt to override veto with 2/3 majority in both houses; since 1789 only overrode 111/1508
vetoes (rarely achieved)
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Do nothing, accept veto (most-likely)
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- Timetabling from committee stage to the floor is controlled by the majority party through the
House Rules Committee
- All revenue bills have second reading in committee of the whole house

Debate usually limited to one hour and strict limit on length of speeches – controlled by bill
managers
- Hard to amend a bill because most bills given a closed rule
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Assessing the legislative process:
Strengths:
- Checks and balances prevent tyranny, forcing compromise between different interests; creates
a pluralist democracy in which power is shared
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- Indivisible and states’ rights are protected; senators can insert amendments or filibuster on bases
of their equal state power and interests
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g
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Important legislation needs the benefit of a conference committee to ensure greater member
participation, which generally leads to more effective process and better legislation
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- High levels of partisanship means parties unwilling to compromise, leading to more gridlock;
Constitution requires compromise for laws to be passed
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Problems and difficulties passing legislation through congress:
- A vast number of bills are introduced; this immediately makes the process crowded
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- There is the need at some stage for super majority votes: 3/5 majority to stop filibuster in the
Senate
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Much power resides with the standing committee and
especially those who chair them
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- The fact that both houses possess equal power makes the process more difficult
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- January 2015-end of March 2016: Congress passed 139 pieces of legislation; but of those, 22
were passed merely to rename a local facility amongst other things
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,
but there was a complete blank on these promises
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- With the increased likelihood of divided government, it reduces the tyranny of one branch
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- It is difficult to overturn a president’s veto
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Congressional oversight:
Oversight of the executive – scrutiny:
- Oversight is congressional review and investigation of the activities of the executive branch of
government
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- Congressional oversight is only really effective when Congress not controlled by the president’s
poverty; all Senate rejection of presidential nominees have been because the Senate was not
controlled by the President’s party; e
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1989 Democrat Senate rejected Republican Reagan’s
nomination of Robert Borke to the Supreme Court; 1989 Democratic Senate rejection of Bush
Snr’s nomination of John Tower as Secretary of Defence; 1999 Republican Senate rejection of
Clinton’s nomination of Ronnie White as federal trial court and his Nuclear Test Ban Treaty;
2001-06 Bush Jnr the Republicans controlled both Houses of Congress, thus oversight of the
executive was light and almost non-existent because of pro-Bush congressional support
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g
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- Senate’s role of ‘advice and consent’ means investigating into background of each nominees,
holding hearings and question candidates then taking a vote; if person is rejected then President
must appoint someone else
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Despite this, President can get around Senate’s refusal of a nomination through recess
appointments; outlined in Article II Section 2 as President has power of “granting Commissions
which shall expire at the End of their next Session”: seen by many as merely a loophole: e
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2004 re-elected Bush Jnr failed to get US Ambassador for UN, John Bolton, confirmed on
grounds of bullying staff and for his hostility towards the UN, as recess appointments must be
approved by Senate by end of session, John Bolton was allowed to represent the USA at the UN
until January 2007 without a nomination process, although Bush calculated he would face a less
hostile Senate after this, Bolton had to resign as he had no chance; Obama made 32 recess
appointments, all to full-time positions; August 2017 nine pro forma sessions used to block
Trump’s recess appointments, because of concerns that Trump might dismiss Attorney General
Jeff Sessions to name his successor while Congress was in recess
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g
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- 1937 United States v Belmont: loophole for Presid

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