ORGANIZATION AND PROCEDURE OF CONGRESS
=Organization of the Two Houses.=--_Officers._--Each house of Congress
is free to organize itself in such a manner as it pleases, and to choose
its own officers, except that the Vice President of the United States
is, by the Constitution, made the presiding officer of the senate. The
presiding officer of the house of representatives is called the speaker;
that of the senate, the president. Each house has one or more clerks who
keep the journals, call rolls, read bills, and have custody of all
bills, resolutions, petitions, and memorials; a sergeant-at-arms who
preserves order, has charge of the halls, pays members their salaries,
and performs various other duties[31]; a postmaster; a doorkeeper; a
chaplain; and other minor officials.
[31] The sergeant-at-arms of the house of representatives has custody
of the mace which is the symbol of the authority of the house. It is a
representation of the Roman _fasces_ in ebony, and is surmounted by a
globe and an eagle in silver. During the session it is kept in the
place provided for it near the speaker's desk, but when disorder breaks
out in the course of the debates, the sergeant-at-arms takes the mace
from its accustomed place and proceeds, bearing it aloft, to the part
of the house where the disorder prevails. He then commands order in the
name of the house, and if the display of the mace is not sufficient to
restore order, the house may order the disorderly member or members to
be arrested.
_Opening of a New Congress._--When a new Congress assembles, the house
of representatives is called to order by the clerk of the preceding
house. He then calls the roll of the members whose credentials or
certificates of election have been filed with him, and if a quorum is
present the house proceeds to the election of a speaker. The members of
each political party represented in the house have already in caucus
agreed upon their candidates, and they are now put in nomination before
the house by some member representing each party. Usually the action of
the caucus of the majority party is equivalent to an election, and the
house has only to ratify its choice. In several instances, however, the
election of the speaker involved long and bitter contests. Thus in 1849,
63 ballots were taken, and again in 1855-1856, 133 ballots were
necessary, and in each case a special rule was adopted permitting a
plurality to elect.
The senate, on the other hand, is always an organized body. The
presiding officer--the Vice President--at the opening of a new Congress
calls the senate to order, and the other officers, who hold during the
pleasure of the senate, resume their duties. The senate elects one of
its own members as president _pro tempore_ to preside over its
deliberations during the absence of the Vice President or in case there
is no Vice President, as has often happened.
_The Oath of Office_ is usually administered to the speaker by the
oldest member in point of service,--called "the Father of the
House,"--after which the speaker calls the other members to the
front--usually by state delegations--and administers the oath to them.
Newly elected senators are escorted to the Vice President's desk,
usually each by his state colleague, and are sworn in individually.
_Adoption of the Rules._--After the administering of the oaths of
office, the house adopts the rules of the preceding Congress for
regulating its procedure pending the adoption of new rules. Usually
this is a perfunctory performance and is carried through without
opposition. At the opening of the sixty-first Congress, however, strong
opposition was manifested toward the old rules and they were not
readopted until important amendments had been made in them.
After the adoption of the rules each house appoints a committee to
notify the other of its readiness for business, and the two then appoint
a joint committee to inform the President of the United States that
Congress is ready to receive any communication that he may be pleased to
make. The message of the President is then laid before each house and
the business of Congress proceeds.
=Quorum.=--The Constitution provides that a majority of each house shall
constitute a quorum for the transaction of business, but that a smaller
number may compel the attendance of absent members in such manner and
under such penalties as each house may prescribe.
_Old Method of Counting a Quorum._--For a long time the method of
ascertaining whether a quorum was present was by a roll call. If the
roll call failed to show the presence of a majority, the speaker ruled
that no quorum was present, even though every member of the house was
actually in his seat. In the course of time this rule came to be
frequently abused by the minority for the purpose of preventing
consideration of measures to which it was opposed. Thus in January,
1890, when the Republicans had only a slight majority in the house of
representatives, the Democrats were able, owing to the absence of a few
Republican members, to break a quorum and prevent consideration of
important measures, by refusing to answer to the roll call. On a notable
occasion in January, 1890, the roll call showed 161 yeas, 2 nays, and
not voting 165, the 165 who refused to vote being Democrats who were
opposed to the taking up of a certain measure which the Republicans
desired to pass. Under the rules the roll call did not show a quorum
present, though more than two thirds of the members were actually in
their seats.
_The New Method._--The Republican majority therefore adopted a new rule,
that members who were actually in their seats were to be counted by the
speaker as present, no matter whether they voted or not. The action of
Speaker Reed in enforcing this rule raised a storm of protest by the
minority, but he courageously stood his ground. The new rule was
readopted by the next Congress though the Democrats were then in the
majority, and it has been continued ever since with the exception of one
or two Congresses when the old rule was reverted to. Much of the
business of Congress is really done, however, when there is no quorum
present, this being permissible so long as the point of "no quorum" is
not raised by any member.
=Open Sessions.=--The ordinary sessions of both houses are open to the
public, though until 1794 the senate held its sessions in secret. When
the senate goes into executive session, as it may do when it is
considering nominations of the President to public office or is engaged
in considering treaties, the galleries are cleared, the doors closed,
and its deliberations are conducted in secret, though, the results of
its transactions usually leak out in some way.
=Seating of Members.=--Until 1913 each member of each house was provided
with a seat and a desk, but in that year the desks were removed from the
house of representatives in order to bring the members nearer together.
Prior to that date, seats were assigned to members by lot at the opening
of Congress, but the leader of the minority party and one or two other
members of long service were usually allowed to select their seats
without resort to the lot. The Democrats are seated on the right of the
speaker and the Republicans on the left. In the senate, each seat as it
becomes vacant is assigned to the member who first makes application for
it to the presiding officer. The house chamber is so large that members
in the rear seats are at a disadvantage, and speech making is carried on
with difficulty. In 1913, however, this inconvenience was diminished by
a reduction in the size of the hall by about one third of the floor
space.[32] The senate chamber is less spacious, and debate can be
conducted with much greater satisfaction and effectiveness. It would be
a great advantage if the number of representatives could be reduced to
250 or 300 so as to make the house less unwieldy, but there is little
probability that such a reform will ever be effected. If smaller in
size, the house could transact its business with more dispatch, give
more careful consideration to bills, and allow members a greater
opportunity for discussion.
[32] Two large office buildings have been erected near the Capitol for
the use of members of both houses.
=Committees.=--Obviously an assembly of more than 400 members cannot
legislate effectively as a whole; its work must be done largely by
committees. To some committee every measure and every petition is
referred, as are also the various recommendations of the President. In
the sixty-seventh Congress (1921-1923) there were thirty-four standing
committees in the senate and sixty in the house. Usually there are also
several select committees, and occasionally a few joint committees. In
the senate, the committees vary in size from three to sixteen members;
in the house from three to thirty-five.
The most important committees in the senate are those on appropriations,
commerce, finance, foreign relations, interstate commerce, judiciary,
military affairs, naval affairs, and public expenditures. The least
important are those on disposition of useless papers, University of the
United States, and Revolutionary claims, since there is little or no
business referred to them. The most important committees in the house
are those on ways and means, appropriations, banking and currency,
public expenditures, foreign affairs, interstate and foreign commerce,
judiciary, military affairs, naval affairs, public buildings and
grounds, rivers and harbors, and rules (twelve members now, formerly
five). The least important is that on the disposition of useless
papers.[33]
[33] There are obvious objections to a system in which legislation
is necessarily framed to a large extent by committees. These
objections are thus stated by Mr. Bryce in his "American
Commonwealth":
1. It destroys the unity of the house.
2. It prevents the capacity of the best members from being brought to
bear on any one piece of legislation, however important.
3. It cramps debate.
4. It lessens the cohesion and harmony of legislation by allowing each
committee to go its own way with its own bills just as though it were
legislating for one planet and the other committees for others.
5. It gives facilities for the exercise of underhand and even corrupt
influence, and encourages "log rolling."
6. It reduces responsibility by dividing it among different committees.
7. It lowers the interest of the nation in the proceedings of Congress.
8. It throws power into the hands of the chairmen of committees,
especially those which deal with finance and other great national
interests.
The chief advantage of such a system is that it enables the house to
deal with a far greater number of subjects than could be otherwise
dealt with, and thus makes possible the dispatch of a vast amount of
work, especially in killing off worthless bills.
_Method of Choosing Committees._--In the senate committee assignments
are nominally made by the senate itself, but in reality they are made
by two committees on committees selected by a caucus of the members of
each party, the recommendations of the two committees usually being
accepted by the senate without debate. Both parties are represented on
each committee, the dominant party, of course, being given a majority of
the places. Thus on a committee of thirteen members, the majority party
is usually represented by eight members and the minority by five; on a
committee of seventeen, the numbers are eleven and six respectively, and
so on.
In the house of representatives, from the beginning until very recently,
all the committees were appointed by the speaker, a power which gave him
great influence in shaping and determining the course of legislation,
since he might constitute the committees with reference to their
friendliness or unfriendliness toward legislative measures that were
referred to them for investigation and report. In making committee
assignments, however, the speaker was not entirely free to follow his
own individual preferences. Thus the tradition of the house required
that he must take into consideration the claims of members whose service
had been long and distinguished, while political gratitude led him to
reward with desirable committee assignments those to whom he was
especially indebted for his election as speaker. Seniority of committee
service was also taken into account when the chairmanship of an
important committee became vacant, the next ranking member of the
committee having a strong claim to be promoted to the vacancy. In 1911,
however, the house, then controlled by the Democrats, adopted a rule
providing for the election of all standing committees by the house; thus
making the method of choosing committees the same as in the senate.
In the house, the chairmanship of every committee, whether important or
unimportant, is given to a member of the dominant party, and of course
also a majority of the other places on the committee, the proportion
between the representation of the two parties being about the same as on
the senate committees.
=Introduction and Reference of Bills.=--After the appointment of the
committees the house is ready for the transaction of legislative
business. Bills are introduced by sending them, indorsed with the name
of the introducer, to the presiding officer's desk, where the fact of
presentation is entered on the journal and the bill is given a
number.[34] Thus the first bill introduced at the beginning of a new
Congress is designated as "S. 1," if presented in the senate, and "H. R.
1," if presented in the house of representatives.
[34] Private bills are delivered to the clerk instead of to the
speaker. The distinction between a public bill and a private bill is
that the former deals with matters of general interest to the public,
while the latter deals with matters of interest to a single individual
or a small class. An example of a public bill is one regulating
commerce; an example of a private bill is one granting a pension to a
particular individual, or settling a claim of a person against the
government. A distinction is also made between a bill and a resolution.
A bill deals with matters of a more fundamental and permanent
character, while a resolution deals with matters of a more temporary
and transient nature. Resolutions are of two kinds: joint and
concurrent. A joint resolution is passed like a bill and requires the
approval of the President but is cast in slightly different form and
is used for making small appropriations, the creation of commissions,
proposal of amendments to the Constitution, resolutions to admit new
states, ordering of printing, and the like. A concurrent resolution is
used for expressing the opinion of Congress on some question of
interest to that body alone and is not submitted to the President for
his approval.
_Reference to Committees._--The next step is to refer the bill to a
committee for consideration, and in the meantime it is printed and
placed on the desks of members. Reference to the appropriate committee
is usually made by the presiding officer, though the house may direct
that it shall be referred to a particular committee.
Some idea of the mass of legislative projects referred to the committees
may be gained from the fact that in the sixtieth Congress 27,114 bills
and resolutions were introduced into the two houses, and that of these,
7,839 were reported by the committees to which they were referred. We
have here a good illustration of the necessity of the committee system,
since it would have been a physical impossibility for either house as a
whole to have considered even slightly so many bills. The committees
sift out of the mass of proposed legislation such measures as they think
worthy of enacting into law, and report their recommendations to the
house as a whole.
_Committee Hearings._--Committees charged with the consideration of
important bills frequently hold public hearings at which interested
parties may appear and present arguments for and against the measures
under consideration. Thus the ways and means committee of the house in
1909 held public hearings at Washington for many weeks on the tariff
bill, and scores of persons appeared to advocate lower or higher rates
on various articles on which duties were to be imposed. Frequently
members who introduce bills appear before committees and urge favorable
action. The more important committees in each house have a regular day
in each week for meeting, and a few of those in the house of
representatives meet twice a week. Most of the committees, however, have
no regular meeting day, being called together by their chairmen as
occasion requires.
_Forms of Committee Action._--The committee to which a bill is referred
may pursue any one of the following courses: (1) It may report the bill
back to the house with a recommendation that it be passed; (2) it may
amend the bill and recommend that it be passed as amended; (3) it may
throw the bill aside and report an entirely new one in its place; (4) it
may report the bill unfavorably with a recommendation that it do not
pass; (5) it may "pigeonhole" the bill, that is, take no action on it at
all, or report it so late in the session that no opportunity is allowed
for its consideration. The latter method of disposal, sometimes called
"smothering," is the fate that awaits the great majority of bills
introduced into Congress. The "smothering" of bills became the subject
of so much complaint among members recently that the rules were amended
so as to allow members to demand that their bills be reported to the
house for consideration. The house, of course, may at any time instruct
a committee to report a bill for its action, but this is rarely done.
The report to the house is usually made by the chairman of the
committee, or some one designated by him. Not infrequently the minority
members of the committee also make a report opposing the recommendation
of the majority. The committee system of legislation is so thoroughly
established in Congress that a bill favorably reported stands an
excellent chance of being passed, while one adversely reported hardly
ever passes.
=Rules of Procedure.=--The Constitution provides that each house may
frame its own rules of procedure, though it requires certain things to
be done in the interest of publicity and to insure a reasonable degree
of careful deliberation. Thus each house is required to keep and publish
a journal which must show how motions are disposed of and the vote for
and against measures voted on. It also requires that on demand of one
fifth of the members present the yeas and nays upon a measure shall be
entered upon the journal. The purpose of this provision is to enable a
small number of members to put the house on record so that the people
may know how their representatives have voted on important measures.
_Filibustering._--This requirement serves a useful purpose, but it is
sometimes taken advantage of by the minority in "filibustering," that
is, in obstructing and delaying legislative proceedings. Thus a member
may move to adjourn or to take a recess and ask that the roll be called
and the yeas and nays on the question be entered upon the journal. If
one fifth of the members join in the demand, the roll must be called and
the process may be repeated indefinitely. On one occasion in the
fiftieth Congress the house remained in session eight days and nights,
during which time there were over one hundred roll calls on motions of
this kind.
_The Rules of the House of Representatives_ have evolved gradually out
of the experience of the house during its long existence, and have come
to be so complex and elaborate that they are really understood by only a
few of the members, principally those who have had long experience in
administering them. They have been revised from time to time, but except
in a few particulars they are essentially what they were in 1880. They
prescribe a certain order of business for each day's work, which,
however, may be departed from by unanimous consent of all the members or
by the adoption of a "special order" reported by the committee on rules.
_Committee of the Whole._--Revenue and appropriation bills are
considered by the house of representatives in committee of the whole.
When the house goes into committee of the whole, the speaker leaves the
chair and calls some one else to preside in his place, and the presence
of 100 members constitutes a quorum. Debate in committee of the whole
is conducted rather informally, and greater freedom of discussion is
allowed. It is when in committee of the whole that many of the lengthy
speeches printed in the _Congressional Record_ are supposed to be
delivered. In reality, however, only a small portion of these speeches
are actually delivered, for members after addressing the house a few
minutes often secure leave to print the remainder of their remarks.
Under this leave, members frequently print long speeches which have
little or no relation to the subject under consideration but are
intended for campaign purposes or for effect upon their constituents.
They are then franked through the mails to the voters throughout the
district which the member represents.
If the bill is a private bill, it is called up for consideration on
Friday, which is private bill day. Most of the private bills are
reported from the committees on claims and on pensions. Six or seven
thousand such bills are passed by each Congress, and they constitute
about nine tenths of the entire number enacted.
_Suspension of the Rules._--The regular order of business may be
departed from at any time on the demand of privileged committees like
those on ways and means, appropriations, elections, rules, and a few
others which have a sort of right of way in the house, because of the
urgent character of the matters with which they deal. Furthermore, by
unanimous consent, often granted, a particular member is allowed to
bring up a bill for consideration outside the regular order. Finally, on
two Mondays in every month and during the last six days of the session,
the rules may be suspended by a two-thirds vote and measures to which
there is little objection may be quickly passed and thus the business of
the house expedited.
=The Speaker and the Committee on Rules.=--No discussion of the
procedure of the house of representatives would be adequate without a
consideration of the part played by the speaker and the committee on
rules in determining the course and character of legislation.
_The English Speaker._--The speakership is an ancient office inherited
from England, where it originated in the fourteenth century, and is an
outgrowth of the practical necessities of legislative procedure. The
American speakership, however, differs widely from its English
prototype. The speaker of the House of Commons has no such power in
shaping legislation and controlling debate as does the American speaker.
He is in fact little more than a moderator with power to put motions,
state questions, and preserve order and decorum in debate. He is
entirely impartial, with no party prejudices.
_Powers of the American Speaker._--The American speaker, on the
contrary, is not merely the presiding officer of the house, but he is an
active party leader who seldom hesitates to give members of his own
party every possible advantage in the course of debate. His right to
appoint the committees of the house until 1911 gave him increased power
over the shaping of legislation, because of the fact that the
legislation of the house has come to be legislation largely by its
committees. As has already been said, he gave the members of his own
party all the chairmanships of committees, as well as a majority of the
places on every committee, so that they easily controlled the work of
the committees and hence of the house itself.
_Recognition._--Moreover, his power of recognition, especially before
1910, that is, the power to grant or withhold the right of discussion,
enabled him to a large degree to prevent consideration of measures to
which he was opposed and to cut off debate by members of the minority
party, joined with the Democrats and brought about several amendments
to the rules, one of which is designed to do away with the chief source
of complaint in regard to the power of recognition.
_Committee on Rules._--Still another source of the speaker's power until
1910 was his control of the committee on rules. The committee consisted
of five members, two from the majority, two from the minority, and the
speaker, who was the fifth member. The speaker appointed his four
associates on the committee and thereby controlled its decisions. If he
wished at any time to have the house take up a bill at the bottom of the
calendar instead of one at the top, or in any other respect depart from
the established order of procedure, he could call the committee together
(it was the one committee that had the right to meet when the house was
in session) and have it report what was called a "special order," to
that effect--an order which the house usually adopted. The opposition to
the power of this committee and more especially to its domination by the
speaker led in 1910 to the adoption of a rule depriving the speaker of
membership on the committee, increasing its size from five to eleven,
and taking the appointment of the committee out of his hands. Since then
it has been elected by the house, and is, it is asserted, a more
representative committee.
=Caucus Methods.=--It is a common practice for the representatives of
each party to hold a caucus before the beginning of the debate upon an
important measure, especially one of a political character, for the
purpose of deciding what shall be the policy of the party toward the
measure. Sometimes a rule is adopted by the caucus binding the members
of the party to vote for or against the bill on the floor. Thus in 1913
caucuses of Democratic and representatives declared the tariff and
currency bills to be party measures and pledged the members to vote for
the bills without amendment. This practice has been criticized on the
ground that where members have bound themselves to vote for a bill
before it has been discussed on the floor, debate is useless since their
minds are no longer open to argument. Perhaps a better procedure would
be to hold the caucus after the discussion has terminated but before the
final vote is taken.
=Final Stages of Procedure.=--The rules of the house of representatives
restrict the time which may be occupied by any member in debating a
measure to one hour, and this cannot be exceeded except by unanimous
consent. If he chooses, he may yield a portion of his time to some other
member. The chairman who reports the bill usually opens the discussion.
He is followed by the ranking member of the minority on the committee,
and these are followed by other members of the committee in their turn.
_The Previous Question._--After the discussion has proceeded for a time,
debate may be terminated and the house brought to a vote by means of the
previous question, which is moved in the form, "Shall the main question
now be put?" When ordered by the house it ends debate and brings the
house directly to a vote. This is an effective method for putting an end
to useless discussion of a measure and taking the sense of the house on
its passage. It is a common form of procedure in legislative bodies,
though the senate, until 1917, had no way of limiting debate.
_Voting on Bills._--Questions on the passage of bills are put by the
speaker as follows: "As many as are in favor say _aye_"; "As many as are
opposed say _no_"; the speaker determining the result by the sound of
the voices. If there is a doubt as to which side has prevailed, a
"division" is called for, in which case those in favor rise and are
counted after which those who are opposed rise and are counted. If there
is still doubt as to the result, "tellers" may be appointed to determine
the vote, in which case those in favor of the measure file between the
two tellers, who make a careful count, after which those opposed pass
between them and are similarly counted. If one fifth of the members
demand that a yea and nay vote be taken, the clerk must call the roll
and record each member's vote, and the result is published in the
journal so that the way in which a member votes may be known to his
constituents and all others who may be interested.
_Passage by the Second House._--When a bill is passed by one house, it
is signed by the presiding officer, after which it is transmitted to the
other house, where it goes through practically the same stages of
procedure as described above. If the bill is passed by the other house
without amendment it is "enrolled," after which it is ready for the
signature of the President. If, however, a bill as passed by one house
is amended by the other, it is customary to appoint a conference
committee, consisting usually of three members from each house, to
discuss the differences and suggest a basis of compromise. The committee
usually recommends that each house recede from its position on certain
points, and the result is reported to each house, which usually accepts
the agreement and the bill is passed. Many important bills are finally
passed in this way, though occasionally the two houses fail to reach an
agreement and the bill fails.
_Approval of the President._--When the bill is presented to the
President he is allowed ten days to make up his mind as to whether he
will sign or disapprove it. If he refuses to sign it, he usually returns
it to the house in which it originated, with a statement of his
objections, after which the house must proceed to reconsider it, and if
it is passed by a two-thirds vote it is sent to the other chamber and if
repassed by it by a two-thirds vote it becomes a law notwithstanding the
veto of the President. But in such cases the yeas and nays must be
entered on the journal of each house so that the record may show that
the bill was properly passed. In case the President does not approve the
bill and neglects to return it within ten days to the house in which it
originated, it becomes law in the same manner as if he had signed it,
unless Congress should adjourn in the meantime so that it cannot be
returned, in which case it does not become law. As a large number of
bills are usually sent to the President during the last ten days of the
session, an opportunity is thus afforded him for defeating bills by
neither signing nor vetoing them. This method of defeating bills is
popularly described by the term "pocket veto," a procedure sometimes
resorted to where the President does not approve a bill and yet does not
wish to take the responsibility for positively vetoing it.
=Procedure in the Senate.=--In the senate, partly by reason of its small
size, partly by reason of its permanence, and partly by reason of the
tradition of senatorial courtesy, the procedure is somewhat different
from that of the house of representatives. For example, the senate rules
are permanent, that is, they continue from one Congress to another and
do not have to be adopted anew every two years.
_The President of the Senate_ is little more than a moderator; indeed,
he may belong to a different political party from that which is in
control of the chamber--a situation that never happens in the house. He
does not appoint the committees of the senate, and so has no power of
predetermining the character of legislation. Moreover, he has no power
to control debate through the power of recognition. The traditions of
the senate require that he shall recognize the first senator who rises
to speak, and that he shall treat the members of both parties
impartially in according recognition for purposes of debate.
_Unlimited Debate._--Until 1917 one of the usages of the senate was the
right of unlimited debate. Owing to the small size of the senate, much
greater freedom of discussion is possible than in the house of
representatives, where there are more than four times as many members.
Debate can also be conducted with much more ease and is much more
effective, since the size of the hall is smaller and members are not
under the necessity of speaking at the top of their voices. While a
member of the house can rarely get an opportunity to deliver a speech
and then only for a few minutes, a senator may usually speak as long as
he pleases. Advantage of this privilege is frequently taken by senators
to deliver long speeches, not so much to convince their colleagues, as
to get their views before the country at large or to make an impression
on their constituents at home. Under the rules as they were before 1917,
there was no limit to a senator's right to debate. The privilege was
made use of occasionally near the close of a session for "filibustering"
purposes. Thus a few senators with strong lungs, large vocabularies, and
a liberal supply of documents from which to read, might consume the time
of the senate for weeks and prevent it from acting on measures to which
they were opposed. Many times in our history a single senator has forced
the senate to abandon the consideration of important measures, by
threatening to consume the remaining time of the session by speech
making. In the last days of one session of Congress, a senator from
Wisconsin spoke continuously for more than seventeen hours in an effort
to prevent action on a currency bill. Near the end of the 64th Congress
(March, 1917) a small group of senators filibustered to prevent the
senate from taking a vote on a bill to give the President authority to
arm American merchant vessels for defensive purposes, notwithstanding
the fact that nearly all the other senators desired to pass the bill.
Shortly thereafter the senate adopted a new rule which makes it
possible, by a two-thirds vote, to limit the debate on any measure to
one hour for each senator. The rule was applied in November, 1919, to
bring to an end protracted discussion of the treaty of peace with
Germany.
=References.=--BEARD, American Government and Politics, ch. xiv.
BRYCE, The American Commonwealth (abridged edition), chs. xiii-xv.
HART, Actual Government, ch. xiv. HARRISON, This Country of Ours,
ch. iii. REINSCH, American Legislatures and Legislative Methods,
ch. i.
=Documentary and Illustrative Material.=--1. The Congressional
Directory. 2. The House and Senate Rules. 3. Precedents of the
House of Representatives, published as a public document in 1909.
4. The Congressional Record. 5. Specimen copies of bills and
resolutions. 6. The last annual message of the President. 7. Copies
of committee reports. 8. Veto messages of the President. 9.
Diagrams of the house and senate chambers.
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
1. Why are rules of procedure necessary in legislative bodies?
2. For what purpose does the Constitution require each house to keep a
journal of its proceedings?
3. Which do you think the better practice, the American rule, by which
each house of Congress settles election contests of its own members, or
the English rule, which places that power in the hands of the courts?
4. What is the reason for allowing a small number of members of each
house to compel the attendance of absent members?
9. Do you think it would be a wise provision to permit the members of
the cabinet to occupy seats in Congress without the right to vote?
10. Trace a bill through Congress, showing the various stages through
which it must pass before becoming a law.
11. Of what committees is your representative a member? Is he chairman
of any committee?
12. Do you think the minority party should be given a larger
representation on the committees of Congress and larger privileges of
debate?
13. Give the names of the five most distinguished speakers of the house
of representatives since 1789.
14. Why is debate more effective in the senate than in the house of
representatives?
15. Which of the two houses exerts the greater influence in determining
national legislation? Give your reasons.
16. What are some of the so-called "usurped" powers now exercised by the
senate?