Congress

• Congress is the legislative branch of the government. It is responsible for passing laws and representing the people.
• It is a bicameral system. Meaning there are two chambers: The house of representatives and the senate
• The house of representatives has 435 members and then amount of representatives a state has depends on its size, so the higher the population, the more representatives there are.
• The senate has 100 members and it is an equal amount for every state so there is 2 per state. Senators are also usually elected for 6 year terms.
• Congressional elections happen every two years. One occurring the same time as the presidential election and the other halfway through the 4 year presidential term also known as mid-term. During the congressional elections the entire house of representatives are elected and 1/3 of the senate are elected.
• Congress has three specific functions:

  • pass legislation
  • Apply oversight
  • Provide representation
• Passing legislation:

  Bills need to be approved identically by both chambers before it is signed into law. Congress is also responsible for proposing amendments to the constitution. A 2/3 majority is needed before amendments can be passed for state ratification.
• Applying oversight:

  Is an essential part of checks and balances which ensures that no other branch of government is gaining too much power or becoming to powerful. They also scrutinise legislation where congressional committees analyse policies and spending.
• Providing representation:

  It is a bicameral system used to represent us citizens and the states. Divided into two categories:

  • political(substantive) representation - members of Congress vote and act in ways that represent the views of the public and their constituents.
  • Social(demographic) representation - the makeup of Congress reflects the makeup of the US public in terms of race, socio-economic status, sex, sexuality etc.
• Two Chambers have broadly equal powers this is known as symmetrical bicameralism. Which is unlike UK Parliament as House of commons dominates House of Lords.
• Comparable power of the house of representatives and the senate strengthens checks and balances. In order to achieve legislative priorities, the president has to persuade both Chambers, which are often controlled by different parties, to approve the same version of the bill.
• As they are fully elected Chambers, they possess democratic mandates which allow them to challenge or support the president.
• Both Chambers have concurrent powers and they are responsible for passing legislation, overriding presidential veto and proposing constitutional amendments. Both can also establish investigations which usually focus on misconduct or poor performance. Both Chambers also vote in favour of a formal declaration of war.
• However a difference is that the house of representatives are the only ones who can initiate money bills although they still need to be approved by the senate as part of congresses power of the purse.
• However the senate is responsible for placing an impeached person on trial. If 2/3 senators vote they can be removed from office. Also has exclusive power to confirm presidential appointments to the judiciary. Also solely responsible for scrutinising and voting to ratify or block treaties.
• Senators do have more individual power than representatives. There is only 100 of them so they have more concentrated powers. And only 1/3 are ever up for re-election at the same time so there are usually tighter majorities in the senate than in the house of representatives.
• Committees are extremely powerful in both Chambers. Roughly 200 committees and sub-committees in Congress. Responsibilities range from political oversight to confirming presidential appointments. Nominees for senior positions in the executive branch and judicial branch face questioning and a vote from relevant senate committees.
• Committees also tend to provide the most scrutiny of bills as they move through the legislative process. Only around 4% of bills make it past the point of being debated and voted on by the whole house or just the senate chamber.
• The house of representatives has traditionally been the more partisan chamber. Because representatives are elected by congressional districts, which have an average electorate of 760,000, most do not need to appeal to the same number of voters as senators. Short two year term is also seen as encouraging to more partisan. Representatives will often want to be able to point to specific achievements in passing or blocking legislation when they seek re-election.
• Six year senate terms are supposed to encourage longer term thinking by giving senators more time to make an impact rather than facing constant pressure of seeking re-election. The senate has become more partisan and polarised in years.
• Legislative process is designed to provide High levels of scrutiny.
• Bill starts in HOR/Senate

  Then a committee is formed to discuss the bill. They amend the bill and then vote on it.

  Then once the bill has been approved by the committees it is debated and amended by the full house. The full house then votes on the bill.

  Then has it been through HOR/Senate?

  yes - a conference committee works through any differences between the versions of the bill that were passed by each chamber.

  then both chambers vote on the bill. Then president writes it into law

  no - veto bill is sent back to congress. veto can be overwritten if two-thirds of both chambers agree. Then it returns to the chamber it began at.
• Legislative process promotes compromise, especially because HOR and the senate both have to agree on the same version of the bill and because both chambers have equal democratic legitimacy.
• It is impossible for a bill to be rushed through without significant scrutiny, especially because of the filibuster in the senate which increases the difficulty of passing legislation.
• A cloture motion ,which ends a filibuster, requires 60 votes (3/5 of the senate) meaning that most bills require some bipartisan support if they are to pass.
• Some critics argue that passing legislation has become increasingly difficult. Between 1983 & 1993 Congress passed an average 5% of bills into law. Between 2013 & 2023 just 2% of bills became law.
• All recent presidents have failed to pass at least one major legislative priority through Congress. E.g Joe Biden had to abandon attempts to pass a federal law upholding abortion rights, which was prompted due to the Dobbs v Jackson women's health organization ruling in 2022.
• Committed have only allowed 4% of legislation to pass through to be debated and voted on in the full house and the senate chamber. While this is a sign of rigorous process, it also gives members of the most influential congressional committees huge amounts of power.
• Members of committees are in the best position to mark up(amend) bills in ways that boost either their congressional district or home state or for partisan purposes. E.g Susan Collins, a republican, was a member of four separate senate committees in the 118th Congress. She successfully amended bills to fund projects in her home state Maine that totalled over $575million.
• Critics of congress believe that the legislative process gives interest groups, Inc corporations, too much influence over law-making.
• Many members of influential committees receive campaign donations from companies in the sectors that they regulate. E.g during her 2022 mid-term election campaign, Cathy McMorris Rodgers, republican, received nearly $300,000 in campaign donations from oil and gas companies. She was a member of the powerful house energy and commerce committee, which she went on to chair after being re-elected.
• Congress has been able to deal with some crises by passing legislation quickly. E.g Congress passed 2nmajor stimulus measures:

  • the CARE act 2020 under Trump and Biden - to address the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Another high profile law passed in recent years include the tax cuts and jobs act 2017, passed in the First year of Trumps presidency, this was the most significant tax reform since the 1980s.
• Congress provides oversight of the federal budget. Congresses power of the purse means that it approves all federal spending.
• The president and the rest of the executive branch can only spend money that has been signed off by Congress. This usually leads to lengthy negotiations between the president, HOR and the senate, who all have to agree on the federal budget.
• Once a budget has been agreed, Congress continues to monitor spending through the house and the senate appropriations committees. The committees regulate federal spending and allocate what they deem to be appropriate amounts of funding needed to implement other legislation. E.g June 2024 the house appropriations committee allocated over $185 million for spending in labour, health and education.
• When the house and senate cannot reach an agreement with the president over federal budget, and previous funding has ran out then there is a federal government shutdown. E.g happened during Obamas presidency when it was disagreed about spending on obamacare.
• Presidents can attempt to re-allocate funds to fit with their priorities. Both Chambers can carry out investigations into the executive branch's performance. The house oversight committee can create investigatory sub-committees that focus on analysing specific aspects of the executive branches performance. E.g sub-committees were created to investigate handling of COVID and withdrawal of troops in Afghanistan.
• Congressional committees oversight of executive tends to be more intense when there is a divided government. E.g Brookings institution, think tank, found that house committees spent undern25% of their time overseeing executive from 2021-2023 (United gov) whereas they spent 35% of their time from 2019-2021 (divided gov).
• Senate oversees treaties negotiated by the president. Senate foreign relations Committee scrutinises every treaty negotiated by the president in detail before recommending to full senate chamber that the treaty should either be approved or rejected. A vote is then held, and 2/3 of the senate need to approve for it to become legally binding.