23 how congress works

Congressional Rules

-Developed to help Congressoperate

-House has more rules thanSenate

why???

-Parliamentary Procedures

both Houses of Congressuse a formal system ofdebate which keeps thedebate orderly

Congressional Leadership

-Majority Leader

-each House chooses aleader of the majorityparty to be floor leader

-Minority Leader

-each House picks aminority party member toits floor leader

-Party Whip

-each party in each Househas a Party Whip to keeptrack of voting forimportant issues

House Majority LeaderSteny Hoyer, D-MD

Senate Majority Leader HarryReid, D-NV

Senate Minority LeaderMitch McConnell, R-KY

House Minority LeaderJohn Boehner, R-OH

House Leaders

-Speaker of the House

-basically runs the Houseof Representatives

-sets up the calendar andschedules bills for debate

Senate Leaders-Vice President

-official leader but only votesin a tie and is rarely present

-President Pro-Tempore

-mostly symbolic positiongiven to the longest servingSenator from the majorityparty V.P. Joe Biden Sen. Robert Byrd, D-

WV

House Leaders

-Speaker of the House

-basically runs the Houseof Representatives

-sets up the calendar andschedules bills for debate

Senate Leaders-Vice President

-official leader but only votesin a tie and is rarely present

-President Pro-Tempore

-mostly symbolic positiongiven to the longest servingSenator from the majorityparty

Speaker Nancy Pelosi

Staff Support

-personal staff of each member ofCongress

-Committee staff who function asexperts in the committees area

-Library of Congress

-General Accounting Office

investigates and reports on gov’tspending

-Government Budget Office

-predicts the costs of gov’tprograms

Library of Congress

Committee Government-developed committees to divide

the work load of Congress

-standing committees--Permanent committees ofCongress who study, revise,and pass legislation

-select committees--committeeswhich study more temporaryproblems in society

-joint committees--committees which involvemembers of both Houses ofCongress meeting together

Created 1958, est. NASA after Sputnik

Committee Membership

-Based on seniority

-Term that refers to howlong a member has been inCongress and is importantin assigning committeememberships

-Party leaders makecommittee assignments

-majority party of eachhouse appoints thechairperson of eachcommittee