Term
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Definition
| Leader of the majority House party; preside over the House, refer legislation to committees, involved in committee assignments of party's members. setting agenda of House activities, formally elected by the members of the House |
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| Majority/Minority Floor Leader |
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Definition
| Majority-helps with stategy, spokesperson for the party, Monitor House floor; Minority- less legislative power, keep party members together as opposition to majority party |
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| Liaison between party's rank-and-file membership and party leaders; Gauge support, Communicate to party members how they should vote |
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| meeting for each party where members set agendas, select committee members and chairs, and hold elections to choose various Floor leaders |
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| By convention, most senior majority party member; Next in line after Speaker |
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| group of a dozen or so members of majority party, one-hour stints as presiding officer; recognizes who is speaking, controls meetings |
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| When a bill gets to the floor for debate, floor manager help split up time for who gets to talk; usually chairman of the reporting committee takes the lead on managing bill on the floor |
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| Congress where committees have most of the power and Party leaders are relatively muted. Occurred in the 1970s, before bills were passed to cut power from committee chairmen |
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| Conditional Party Government (CPG) |
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Definition
| We should expect party government when Parties are internally homogeneous and parties are clearly different from each other |
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Definition
| What percent of roll call votes in a Congress had over 50% of Democrats opposite of over 50% of Republicans; measure of party disagreement |
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| Measures of intra-party cohesion; Member-Level proportion of votes party votes on with the member voted with their party's position |
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Definition
| Up until the 1960s and 70s, Committee chairmanships were held by senior members; giving privileges and positions to senior ranking members |
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Definition
| Distributional Hypothesis; Informational hypothesis; Party Hypothesis; Structure Induced Equilibrium |
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| Distributional Hypothesis |
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Definition
| Gives MCs policy influence in areas important to their reelection-get material benefits (pork) for distrit; autonomous committees, everyone lets each other get what they want |
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Definition
| Division of labor to increase specialization, Specialize to develop expertise to better understand potential effects of policy; Full chamber benefits from this |
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Definition
| Committee members are agents/instruments of their party; support party's agenda/proposals, benefits the parties |
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Term
| Structure Induced Eqiulibrium |
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Definition
| Committee system is the structure that induces an equilibrium; organization causes a predictable stable outcome; where as a Condorcet's paradox would induce chaos |
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Definition
| Single-peaked preferences; policy at median voter's ideal point is the Condorcet winner |
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Definition
| Committees have jurisdiction over creating bills on certain topics. Example: Environmental law is broken down into 11 committees, all having different jurisdiction than the other committees, although sometimes these jurisdictions overlap |
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Definition
| permanent entity created by public law or House or Senate rules; they continue from Congress to Congress but sometimes changes-eliminated, name changes |
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| In the House. Especially powerful committees that all MCs highly value- Rules, Appropriations, Ways and Means, Budget |
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Definition
| can influence essentially all legislative matters in the House; determines when a bill goes to the floor for debate and determines rules of debate |
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Definition
| Holds power of the purse and Jurisdiction over spending bills |
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Definition
| Jurisdiction: Taxation, trade, Social security; Tax bills must come from this |
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Definition
| Write budget resolutions; 5 from appropriations, 5 from ways and means, rest from other committees; limits in years can serve |
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Definition
| Issues-based motivations (personal or reelection; Examples: banking, commerce, foreign affairs, education and labor |
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Term
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Definition
| Classic pork-barrel committees (credit claiming; Ex: agriculture, armed services, transportation and infrastructure |
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Term
| Select/Special Committees |
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Definition
| temporary panels (lifespan is usually just one Congress); usually do not have legislative authority; study, investigate, make recommendations |
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Term
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Definition
| Includes members from both House and Senate; used for study, investigation, oversight, and other routine activities; usually appointed by Speaker and chamber's presiding officer |
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Definition
| "The Third House of Congress"; Before a piece of legislation goes to President to sign, must pass House and Senate in identical form, reconciles differences between House and Senate versions |
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Term
| Committee Assignment Process |
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Definition
| Basic process: MCs make requests, Party's comittee on committees (CC) makes decision, party caucus approves, full chamber approves |
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Term
| Committee on Committees (CC) (generic term) |
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Definition
| Each of the party's CC has its own criteria as to how to determine what committee a MC should be placed on. All Senate Dems have been assigned one major committee before any party member receives a second major assignment |
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Definition
| Party Caucus is likely to awards itself extra seats on Congress Committees |
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Term
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Definition
| bill referred to committee(s) by Senate presiding officer or House Speaker; given to multiple committees due to overlapping jurisdictions can be used strategically, not used often in the Senate |
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Term
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Definition
| Committees or Subcommittees conduct hearings on a bill to listen to a wide variety of witnesses such as the sponsors, federal officials, private citizens, etc. Usually follow a traditional format |
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Term
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Definition
| After hearings, committee members decide on the bill's actual language, bill is marked up or amended. Committee members email their colleagues with their amendment, must decide whether to support a bill that might be good for the nation or oppose it because of the opposition of their constituents |
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Term
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Definition
| If committee votes to send the bill to the House or Senate, the staff prepares a report, subject to committee approval, describing the purposes and provisions of the legislation |
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Term
| Positive vs. Negative Committee Power |
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Definition
| Positive- Get things done. Pass legislation the committee wants; most preferred policy of committee is at its median; need to pass on the floor; Negative- Gatekeeping power. Refusing to report out bill. |
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Definition
| Committees decide what information comes out to Congress and what doesn't |
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Term
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Definition
| Same process as passing a bill-like a bill, has force of law; except some budget stuff, creates temporary commissions, propose constitutional amendments, declare war |
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Term
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Definition
| Must pass both houses of Congress but does not require presidential signature; does not have force of law; deal with rules applicable to both houses |
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Term
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Definition
| Deals with stuff within one house-rules and committee assignments, no force of law |
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Term
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Definition
| Bill does not have to even be reported from committee, 40 minutes of debate, no amendments, requires 2/3 vote for passage; example: naming federal buildings or post office |
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Term
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Definition
| chairman of reporting committee makes a rules request, hearings on the request, house floor votes on the rules; Open, Closed, Modified |
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Definition
| Any germane amendments can be proposed |
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| Vary in restrictiveness, time limit, number of amendments, contents of amendments, etc. |
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| Changes to bill. Can be proposed at various times in a bill's life cycle |
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Term
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Definition
| Three requirements-believe that bill in original form would beat current status quo in vote, believe original would lose to an amended version, believe that the amended bill would lose to status quo; rarely works |
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Definition
| Amendments to bill can only be to what the bill is about i.e., farming bill can only be amended about corn laws, not taxes on small businesses. Only in House |
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| Unanimous Consent Agreements (UCA) |
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Definition
| Helps schedule for floor action, limit time and amendments, need unanimous approval-one Senator can ruin it for everyone; in House majority rules, in Senate unanimous support neede |
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Term
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Definition
| need signatures of a majority when bill is stuck in committee, placed on Discharge Calendar for 7 days, can then be called up to the floor for consideration |
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Term
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Definition
| parliamentary artifice designed to expedite consideration of legislation. Quorum in the committee of the whole is only 100 members, Speaker appoints a majority party colleague to preside over the committee, only in the house |
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Term
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Definition
| minimum number of members to debate a bill/conduct a hearing |
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Definition
| Ability to talk continuously, get modifications delay or kill legislation through threat of filibuster; only in the Senate |
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Definition
| (Senate) Make request to their party leader not to schedule a measure for floor action, informal custom, signal threat of future actions like not supporting on the floor |
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| in Senate, 60 votes to invoke cloture, ends debate and imposes germaneness requirement on amendments; ends t |
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| concept of issue positions |
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Definition
| scores created by political scientists that look at roll call votes to determine MC's ideology based on a -1 to 1 scale |
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Definition
| exchange support so that all individuals included in the deal can achieve their individual goals, i.e., vote-trading across bills |
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