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Chapter Six: Congress
The primary goal for most members of Congress is keeping their jobs. Unlike candidates for legislatures in many other countries, candidates in the United States win or lose campaigns primarily as a result of organizing, funding, and managing their own reelection efforts. Although parties can help (or hurt) their members' electoral chances through districting, financial support (or lack of it), party identity, and other factors, most campaigns since World War II have been centered on individual candidates. In most of this time period, less partisan electorates have meant that voters are easier for incumbents to attract but harder for them to hold if conditions change or if an incumbent faces a quality challenger. In recent years, however, the parties have become increasingly polarized in the electorate and within the legislature.
Once elected to Congress, members face costs in gathering information, coordinating action, resolving conflicts, and acting for the common good. To overcome these difficulties, the Senate and especially the House of Representatives have come to rely on two main institutions: parties and committees.
Members delegate power to their parties to help them pursue common goals in the legislature. Because most decisions are made by majority vote, there are many rewards to forming a permanent coalition. However, getting the party to act cohesively requires that members delegate enforcement and coordination powers to their leadership. As parties become more homogeneous, they are willing to delegate more power to their leadership to decrease their transaction costs and increase conformity.
Most of the meaningful day-to-day work of Congress is conducted in committees. The process of passing legislation is itself convoluted, to say the least, and the vast majority of bills introduced in Congress die well before they are even put to a vote on the chamber floor. Breaking the business of lawmaking into separate issue areas allows members to sift through huge amounts of legislation while gaining specialized knowledge that benefits the body as a whole. In delegating tasks to committees, members face the risk that the committees will act in their own narrow self-interest. To prevent this, parties usually exercise substantial control over committee membership and jurisdiction, particularly in important committees.
After reading this chapter, you should understand…
- why the Republicans believed that gaining control of both houses of Congress in 1994 would allow them to influence national policy more than in prior years when they controlled the presidency but not Congress
- the formal powers of Congress established by the Constitution
- how the rules for selecting representatives have had profound effects on the way our government works, and how changes in these rules can favor one group over another
- how local and national considerations affect the chances that a member will be reelected
- the difference between candidate-centered and party-centered elections and why each of the two strategies has been selected over time
- the value of incumbency and its limits
- why members often pursue policies that sacrifice the common interest to their districts' interest and how this incentive can be counteracted
- how the rules and organizational structures of Congress affect the distribution of power and policymaking in these bodies
- the characteristics of the people who serve in Congress and how members differ from the general population
- how Congress structures itself to gain information and reduce transaction costs and the potential disadvantages of relying on this structure
- how Congress organizes itself to deal with the competition between the individual and collective needs of members
- what members gain and lose by attaching themselves to parties and how these benefits increase when their party is in the majority
- why members sometimes delegate more power to their leaders than in other times
- the necessary hurdles legislation must jump to become law and how these obstacles make laws easier to block than to enact
- why members are usually more popular in their districts than in Congress as a whole
- How do the differences between the House and the Senate reflect the competing interests of small and large states?
- How does the electoral system established by the Constitution differ from that of other parliamentary democracies?
- What constraints are placed on states when they draw districts for congressional elections? How can parties give their members an advantage through districting?
- How has the role of political parties in congressional elections changed over time? How did congressional incumbents help change this role? How did the 1994 election change the prevailing pattern of electoral competition?
- Why do members of Congress worry about reelection when incumbents are so consistently successful at winning another term? Why do incumbents work so hard to appear invulnerable?
- What impact do national forces have on a member's chances for reelection?
- What is the difference between a member being responsive and a member being responsible? How does the method of election help foster one behavior over the other?
- Why is it so difficult for Congress to put the interest of the public above special interests? What strategies can members use to overcome these difficulties?
- Why did the Tax Reform Act of 1986 pass when other similar attempts had failed in the past?
- Why weren't members of Congress allowed the chance to vote on censuring President Bill Clinton?
- What are the different types of committees used in Congress and why might they matter?
- Why does the House have stricter rules and greater leadership control than does the Senate? How do these differences affect the day-to-day operation of the chambers?
- If members are elected by majorities from their districts, why do interest groups sometimes prevail, even in conflicts with majority opinion?
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