Lecture Notes on Congress the Presidency

Govt 2305

American Government

Professor Sutter

Congress: The Federal Legislative Branch

The Structure of Congress

Article I of the United States Constitution created the bicameral Congress, with the House of Representatives elected directly by the people of the states and a Senate elected by the state legislatures. (Amendment 17 altered the Constitution in 1913 to allow for the direct election of U.S. Senators from the states.) Each state is represented in the Senate by two senators regardless of the states population. Each states representation in the House is based on the states population. The total membership of the House was set at 435 by law in the early 20th century. Senators serve a six-year term of office. Approximately one-third of the Senate is up for election every two years. Members of the House serve a two-year term of office and the entire House is up for election every two years. A new Congress is formed in January of every odd-number year following the national election in the preceding November.

The makeup of House districts in each of the states is reconfigured every ten years by each states legislature follow a report of the national census. Under current law, Congress apportions the House by the equal proportions method, and then the states legislatures redraws new House district lines to represent the new national allocation of House seats and to reflect population shifts. This process is known a redistricting.

Under our first constitution, the Articles of Confederation, a Congress did exist but was unicameral and essentially powerless as a national governing body. No national executive or judicial branch existed. The framers of the Constitution of 1789 extended broad new governing powers to the federal government and placed those powers principally in the hands of the new Congress. The principal powers given Congress can be found in Article I, Section I of the Constitution and include the power to tax and spend, to regulate commerce, raise and support an army and navy, create and regulate the currency, declare war and to make all Law which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing powers. This necessary and proper clause, when combined with one or more of the specific powers enumerated in Article I, Section, has allowed Congress to dramatically expand the national governing powers without the necessity of amending the Constitution.

The Organization of Congress

Congress is organized on the basis of three factors: political party affiliation, leadership, and committees.

The two major political parties produce the leadership organization and the committee organization of Congress. Nearly all members of Congress are elected as either Republicans or Democrats. Third party candidates, usually called Independents in Congress, are rarely elected rarely win election to Congress and virtually never serve in positions of leadership.

Each political party elects its own leaders and these officers supervise and operations of the Congress. Article I of the Constitution states that the Vice President of the United States serves ex officio as the president of the Senate and may vote in the Senate but only in case of a tie. Until the twentieth century, the vice-president often served a leadership role in the Senate. However, in the early part of the twentieth century, party leaders assumed control of the Senate, with the party in the majority gaining principal control over the body. The Senate Majority Leader (the leader of the majority party in the Senate) has extensive powers over the organization and operation of the body. The Constitution calls for the Speaker of the House of Representatives to be the elected leader of that chamber. The speaker is elected by the members of the House at the start of a new Congress every two years. In effect, the speaker is elected by the majority party because at the start of a new Congress, members vote as a block for the candidate selected as their nominee for speaker, and, thus, whichever party is in the majority, that party elects the speaker.

The party which has the majority membership in each of the respective two bodies effectively controls that house. Currently, the U.S. House is controlled by a Republican majority and the U.S. Senate is controlled by a Democratic majority.

Most of the actual legislative work of Congress, both in the House and Senate, is done in committees. There are four types of committees: (a) standing committees, (b) select committees, (c) joint committees, and (d) conference committees. The bulk of the work of Congress is done in standing committees which are functionally organized in ways similar to the organization of the executive departments. All bills are submitted to standing committees and must go through these committees before being approved by the full House or Senate. Select Committees are created ad hoc for special reasons to investigate some current issue or problem that would not be handled by the regular standing committees. Joint Committees have members from both the House and Senate to serve unique, particular function. These committees are created for reasons such as national security, such as the Joint Committee on Intelligence or for administrative functions common to both bodies, such as the Joint Committee on the Library of Congress. Conference Committees are created whenever a bill is passed in different versions by the House and Senate. Conference Committees settle differences between the two versions. Conference Committees have members from both House and Senate and function only until a

given bill is reconciled. The significance of conferences committees derives from the fact that all bills must pass both houses in exactly the same language to be reported to the president for approval or veto.

Making Law

Only standing members of the Congress may introduce bills for consideration. Revenue or tax bills can only be introduced in the House of Representatives. A bill may be introduced or sponsored by one or more members. In the House, the sponsor introduces legislation by dropping the bill into the hopper, which on the House clerks desk. The House clerk is responsible for tracking all proposed legislation. In the Senate, the presiding officer must recognize a bills sponsor so that the Senator may introduce the bill. The bill is assigned a prefix (HR for House bills, S for Senate bills) and a number, and the name(s) of the bills sponsor(s) is printed on the bill.

The bill is then assigned to a standing committee for review. It is here, in the standing committees, where the bulk of the legislative work is done. The bill is placed on the calendar of the committee to which it has been assigned. If the committee decides not to consider the bill, the bill essentially dies. If the bill is accepted for consideration, the full committee assigns the bill to a subcommittee for hearings and debate. After hearings, subcommittee members markup the bill, i.e., amend, rewrite or change sections of the bill, created a committee print. If the subcommittee votes to approve the bill, it sends the revised version back to the full committee where the entire processhearings, markup and votingis repeated.

If a Senate committee approves a bill, the bill is placed on the calendar for floor debate. Debate is scheduled through a unanimous consent agreement. In the House, a bill must be approved by the Rules Committee and given a place on the calendar before it can be debated on the floor (although budget bills do not go to the Rules Committee). In the House, bills are placed on one of four calendars: (1) Union Calendar, which schedules tax and appropriations bills; (2) House Calendar, which schedules bills that do not raise revenue or involve expenditures or property; (3) Consent Calendar, which schedules bills raising little controversy and will be passed without debate; or (4) Private Calendar, which schedules bills requiring the federal government to pay an individual or group.

Debate on the House floor is limited due to the size of the body. On the House floor, the bill is debated, amendments offered, and a vote taken by the full House. If the bill passes the House, it is sent to the Senate for consideration if it was not considered there at the same time. In the Senate, a bill may be help up by a filibuster or a hold. A hold prevents the bill from coming to the floor until it is removed. A senator asked to be told before a given bill comes to the floor. The hold signals that opposition may be on the horizon for the given bill and the leadership is thus reluctant to bring it to the floor. A filibuster is a Senate procedure allowing a senator who is seeking to block consideration of a bill to hold the floor by long speeches or unlimited debate.

For the Senate to end a filibuster, a cloture vote must be taken requiring sixty senators to cut off debate.

If the two chambers of Congress pass different versions of the same bill, a conference committee is established made up of members from the original House and senate committees. If the conference committee fails to reach a compromise, the bill dies there. If a compromise bill is agreed upon in conference, the new bill is sent to the House and Senate for a final vote. No amendments or changes are allow. If the bill is not passed by both houses, it dies. If it is passed by both houses, it is sent to the president.

A bill must pass both houses of the bicameral Congress in exactly the same language in order to go on to the president for his approval or veto.

The president has ten days to decide on a bill he receives from Congress. He may sign the bill, and the bill becomes law. He may veto the bill. Congress may override the presidents veto with a two-thirds vote in each chamber (this supermajority requirement makes overrides difficult to achieve). The president may wait the full ten days at which time then the bill becomes law without his signature if Congress is still in session. If Congress adjourns before the ten days are up, he may choose not to sign the bill and it is then considered vetoed by the pocket veto.

Unique Duties of the Two Chambers

The House and the Senate each have unique duties. Only the House may, as stated earlier, initiate revenue bills. Only the House may bring articles of impeachment (much like the actions of a grand jury bringing an indictment against an individual) against federal officers for actions which the House may deem misconduct. The House may elect the president if no presidential candidate earns a majority in the electoral college. The Senate, after the House has impeached a federal official, acts a judge and jury. It alone has the power to convict and remove the official from office. The Senate, if no presidential candidate ears a majority in the electoral college, is solely responsible for electing the vice president. Only the Senate has the advise and consent power. The Senate alone has the power to review and approve (or reject) presidential nominations of U.S. ambassadors, judges and justices to the federal bench, and high officials of the executive branch (most prominently, the presidents Cabinet). Also, the Senate alone has the power of advise and consent over foreign treaties made by the president.

Legislative Oversight

Since Congress authorized the creation of most federal departments, bureaus and agencies and funds them all through their budgetary power, Congress assumes the role of oversight to examine the activities of executive department entities to determine whether they comport with the

mandate established by Congress in the authorizing legislation creating them and to determine if the expenditures of the agencies meet the guidelines set by the Congress. Congress examines also the bureaucratic decisions by executive agencies. Congress can nullify and executive branch regulation by the passage of a joint resolution in both chambers within sixty days of the announcement of the regulation and the acceptance by the president. Congress also plays a significant role in the determination of U.S. foreign and military policy through its constitutional powers and its oversight activities. Tension between the Congress and the president has long existed over the question of war making. Only Congress may declare war, but the president, as commander-in-chief executes the operations of the military and has sent troops overseas for military excursions dozens of times. Congress sought to curtail what it saw as the presidents war-making excesses with the passage, over presidential veto, of the War Powers Act in 1973.

Constituent Service

And important role of members of the Congress is to serve the needs of their constituents back in their home states. Members of Congress work to provide federal money for projects in their home states and home districts to boost the local economies. Members of Congress also serve their constituents by interceding on behalf of their constituents who have problems with executive branch agencies that they, the constituents, can readily resolve. Since members of Congress provide the funding for executive branch operations, executive branch agencies and departments are quick to provide service to the members of Congress who seek the resolution of conflicts constituents have with the federal agencies and departments. This provides the members of Congress with constituents who appreciate the intercession on their behalf by the member, often through voting for the member for reelection. The member of Congress, in turn, appreciates the action by the executive department or agency in resolving their constituents problems promptly and positively, and thus, are more likely to favorably consider budget requests by those agencies come time to prepare the annual federal budget.

The Presidency: The Federal Executive Branch

The History and Structure of the Presidency

Under the countrys first constitution, the Articles of Confederation, there was no national executive branch of government, and, hence, no president. The founders of the country were concerned that a governing powers centralized in one person would lead to the abused they had complained of the King of England in the Declaration of Independence in 1776. However, with

the proposed creation of a new, powerful federal government in the Constitutional Convention of 1787, the framers of the new constitution eventually resolved their concerns by placing the principal national governing powers in the hands of the Congress in Article I, and limited the powers of the new president in Article II to that of one who would execute the programs and policies of the Congress, with, of course, certain independent powers given the president as a check and balance on Congress.

Today, however, if one were to ask a person on the street to name his U.S. Representative in Congress, or even one of his two U.S. Senators from his state, most would be at a loss. Ask the person to name the President of the United States, the person on the street would have no trouble whatsoever in responding. Indeed, not only better know of the president and his functions, most people pay little regard to Congress. This public perception is a reflection of the shift of power from where the framers intended itin the hands of Congressto the hands of the president. This shift only occurred in the twentieth century, but the shift has been so great, scholars have dubbed the modern presidency the Imperial Presidency, suggesting an almost king-like power in the hands of the modern president, a state which the framers distinctly wished to avoid.

Under Article II of the Constitution, the president is required to be a natural-born citizen of the United States, be at least thirty-five years old. Article II set the term of office for the president at four years and required no limitation on the number of terms he served. However, the first president, George Washington, chose to serve only two terms and a two-term only president was set. Franklin D. Roosevelt nevertheless was elected to four terms during the time in history when the United States was threatened by the Great Depression and World War II. After his vice president, Harry Truman, took office in 1944 and was, despite all predictions to the contrary, was re-elected in 1948, many Republicans feared that the Democratic Party might have a permanent lock on the presidency and pushed the passage and ratification in 1951 of the 22nd Amendment which limits presidents to two four-year terms, or no more than ten years in office.

The presidency was affected by another constitutional amendment, adopted in 1967, which established procedures for filling vacancies in the vice presidency and presidency as well as creating means to deal with the disability of a president. Constitutional ambiguity over the line of presidential succession had been clarified in 1947 a legislation which called for, after the vice president, a line of succession including, in order, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the President pro tempore of the Senate, then the Secretary of state, treasury and defense, and other Cabinet heads in order of the creation of their department. A series of heart attacks suffered by President Dwight Eisenhower in his two-terms in office and then the assassination of President John F. Kennedy led to the 25th Amendment passage and ratification. After the assassination of President Kennedy in November of 1963, Lyndon B. Johnson served at president for the remainder of 1963 through all of 1964 and part of January of 1965 without a vice president. Had Johnson died in office during that period, Speaker of the House John McCormack, in his early 70s, would have become president. Although Ronald Reagan was 69 when elected president in 1980, the Gipper did not look his age. Speaker McCormack did. Gerald R. Ford was the first appointee under the 25th Amendment. Named vice president by President Richard Nixon following the resignation Vice President Spiro Agnew after Agnews indictment on criminal charges, Ford served as vice president only a few months before President Nixon resigned from office facing certain impeachment and conviction for his

Watergate crimes. President Ford then named former New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller as his vice president under the 25th Amendment.

The Powers of the Presidency

The Constitution grants the president fewer powers than it does the Congress. Most of Article II deals with the procedures for election and service, succession and impeachment. However, specific significant powers are granted the president.

Military Power: Article II, Section 2 names the president commander-in-chief of the armed forces. As stated before, only Congress has the authority to declare war, the president has the actual power to make war in that he has final responsibility for conduction military policy and deployment.

Judicial Power: The president appoints members of the federal judiciary to the bench including justices to the Supreme Court of the United States. When there is a vacancy on the Supreme Court or one of the lower federal courts, the president nominates a jurist based on political, ideological, and practical factors. Federal judges serve for live. Because of this and because of the significance of federal court appellate rulings, particularly Supreme Court decisions, is said that perhaps the most significant long-term affect a president can have on the country is his appointments to the Supreme Court and the lower federal courts. All the presidents judicial nominees must be approved by the Senate under its advise and consent powers. Article II authorizes the president to grant reprieves and pardons for federal crimes, but not conviction by impeachment. Perhaps the most famous pardon in recent times occurred in 1974 when President Gerald Ford pardoned former President Richard Nixon for federal crimes he may have committed when president.

Foreign Policy Powers: Based on his constitutional powers in this area, the president is the countrys chief diplomat. The president appoints U.S. ambassadors, with the advise and consent of the Senate. Article II states that the president is to receive foreign ambassadors and ministers on behalf of the United States. The president also makes treaties with foreign nations, dependant, also, on the Senates advise and consent power. Most treaties are approved by the Senate. One significant instance of the Senate rejecting a foreign treaty negotiated and signed by a president was the Treaty of Versailles in 1919 which created the League of Nations. President Woodrow Wilson worked tirelessly for the treaty in hopes of preventing an outbreak of another world war through the creation of the League. Without the United States as a signatory the League of Nations was essentially a failure and another world war started less than two decades later.

Executive Powers: The president is empowered by Article II to appoint cabinet officers and other high officials of the federal government. Cabinet officers and most of the high executive officers appointments require the advise and consent of the Senate. The most recent addition to

the presidents cabinet was the new Office of Homeland Security, created by Congress with the Homeland Security Act of 2002. Perhaps the most significant statement of the presidents executive powers and the most succinct statement of the overall nature of the presidency as designed by the Constitution occurs in the last sentence of Article II, Section 3, which states that the president shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed. Indeed, the framers of the Constitution created the presidency to carry out, to execute, the laws passed by Congress. And this is the function of the president in his role as the chief executive of the country.

Legislative Powers: While only members of Congress can introduce and pass legislation, the president was given significant powers to propose and influence legislation. Article II authorizes the presidents State of the Union address in Section 3: He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient. The presidents address to Congress, which was for a number of years starting with President Thomas Jeffersons administration, was delivered to the Congress only in written form, has been given since President Woodrow Wilsons administration as a speech to a joint session of Congress which has been for many years now televised to a world audience, guaranteeing enormous impact by the presidents speech, now given each year in January. As mentioned previously in the section on Congress, the president is given the authority by the Constitution to influence legislation through the veto process. The president is given the power by the Constitution to convene one or both Houses during times of crisis and to adjourn Congress when the members cannot agree on adjournment. These are powers seldom which have been seldom used.

The Modern Presidency

The growth of the modern presidency took hold with the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt in the 1930s and 40s. FDR oversaw a dramatic expansion of federal power thanks to the adoption of his New Deal programs by Congress to combat the ravages of the Great Depression. The national governments power also expanded during the course of World War II. Much of these expanded powers were controlled by the president himself. Accelerating the growth of presidential power during this period was the acceptance and popularization of broadcasting in the country in the form of radio. The strength and number of radio stations and receivers grew geometrically in the later 20s and early 30s. FDR was the first president to make effective use of radio in making dramatic use of one of the presidents most important powers: the power to persuade. Franklin Roosevelts cousin, Theodore Roosevelt claimed during his administration in the first decade of the century that the presidency was a bully pulpit, meaning that the presidency was in a unique position, as the only nationally elected figure, to speak to and for the American people. Yet Theodore Roosevelt, in four years of using his bully pulpit could, at most, speak directly to a few thousand people. But with a microphone in his office or study, Franklin Roosevelt could speak to millions of Americans at once, urging them to accept his plans and proposals, urging them to call their members of Congress and demand they get on the program, the presidents program, of turning the country around. Before radio, most Americans had never heard the voice of their president. Now he sat with them in their living rooms. The bully pulpit

was now magnified a million-fold and the president had a means of taking the business of making public policy out of the hands of Congress and grasping it in his own.