Congress notes From Friday April 4th - Wednesday April 10th

The Committee System
"The Legislative Committees"

4 types of Committees
1. Steering and Policy Committees ( Party Caucus and Conference)
( When a new Congress is sworn in they break up, the Dems and the Republicans, Independents have to decide which party would join. All of the independents tend to vote with the democrats)
2. Hill Committees - Are a part of the national party organizations. At one point they were banned from meeting in the Capitol building.
3. Procederal Committees- There are two of these
1. Joint conference committee (Conference committee) Both chambers meet
2. Committee of the whole ( To iron out a bill) { Ad hoc = As needed}
4. Legislative committees

Standing Committees
( Parent, Permanent "All the same")
- More or less permanent
- Some are "Exclusive" which brings prestige, but also a more significant committment of time.
( Ways and means committees pays for taxes)
( Appropiations ways and means and rules)

Subcommittees
- Appropriations standing committees traditionally has the most subcommittees
- Budget committees have none
- Average standing committee has about 5.

Select or Special Committees
- Created on an Ad Hoc Basis
- Cannot recieve or report legislation
- Primarily investigative - agenda is "topical"


Joint Committees
- Both house and Senate members participate
- Economic, library , Printing, taxation.
[ Which is the most important, and always in the news? Taxation]
- Not a conference committees


Committee Workload
"Typical Senator has more"

Which are the Hill committees
- House ways and means committees
- Senate rules is not a Hills Committee
- Steering committees
- committees on committees
- 4, 8, 16 hour days
- Senators spend more time in committees because there are so few Senators, and a lot of committee work.

In teh House of Representatives
- Members are on eithe r1 exclusive or 2 non-exclusive standing committees
- If on 2 standing committes, 1 is usually more prestigious than the other
( How mnay standing committees are in the 110th? 20 in the house 16 in the Senate)
- Members average 4.5 subcommittees assignments

In the Senate
- Norm is two major and one minor standing committee
- Many exceptions to the rules
- Serve on roughly 8 subcommittiees

Committee Assignment Process
"The Role of steering Committees"

( How many steering committess should there be? 8... 2 Dems, 2 REPs in each house... so 4 in total.... But there are 7. The Dem in teh House keeps both together, but they have two chair persons)
- Steering committees says who's on committees
- Policy committee- set the platform
- The Steering committees are moest active in the beginning when they are setting up their game plan.


Variables influencing committee assignments
1. Electroal vulnerability
a. Insulate the vulnerable from interest group pressure
b. Give them assignments their constituents will value
2. Party Privelege- Or party discretion, the role of "carrots and sticks"

Variables Influencing Committee Assignments Contd

3. Property rights - "two meanings"
a. The right of a state to hold a committee assignment
b. The right of a member to hold a particular committee assignment


Committee Chairs
"Gate Keepers"

Selection Process
- Informally selected by majority party leaders in the chamber
- Party caucus or conference officially vote
-Senior members from the majority party is the default choice

MSC.
- Each member can be chair of only one committee
( Standing or sub)
- Chair-swapping took place in the 107th.

Congressional Policy Making
- Symbols over substance
- Sybolic legislation (propaganda?) provides opportunities to builda re-election constituency.
- substance is controversial and creates enemies
- there is alot of media coverage of a bill introductions, committee hearings. but...

Interventalism - or minor change
- Using the previous year's budget as a guide- has resulted in deerementalism, as well
- Based on fear (?)
- Pragmatic response to difficult situations (?)
- Do people wnat change?