ORGANIZATION OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The House of Representatives
• After each census, every ten years, each state decides how to draw the districts
given to them based on the census population records. A state may gain, or lose
representatives in this process, known as reapportionment. For example, Illinois
had 19 districts in 2011, but due to the 2010 census they now have 18.
• In history there have been several times that the party in power in each state has
tried to draw the districts so as to favor their party, this is called gerrymandering.
• The Supreme Court ruled in 1964 that districts
must have roughly the same number of people so
that one person's vote in an election is worth the
same as another's. This is known as the "one
person, one vote" principle. Still, the majority
party often tries to draw the boundaries to
maximize the chances for its candidates to win
elections.
• Currently the number of representatives in the House is
set by law at 435, who are divided out amongst the states
based on population.
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The elected head of the U.S. House of
Representatives is Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio)
• The Speaker is also an elected Congressional
Representative from his home district, in his
home state. John Boehner was elected by
the people of the 8th Congressional District of
Ohio.
• The Speaker is elected by the members of the
House of Representatives once the newly
elected House meets in January every two
years.
• The Speaker has a lot of power in Congress as
it is he who decides the agenda, makes
parliamentary rulings, and determines who
will chair what committees.
• The Speaker is also the chair of the Rules
Committee which determines the rules of how
debates are done on proposed bills, and the
voting procedures on them.
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The Speaker of the House
• The Speaker of the House is the second in line to the Presidency, right behind
the Vice President
• The Speaker is also responsible for supervising the elected and unelected
offices of the House, including the:
• Sergeant At Arms (in charge of the security of the House)
• Parliamentarian (the legal expert on parliamentary procedure)
• Chief Administrative Officer (in charge of paid staffs and clerks)
• Clerk of the House (in charge of the paperwork of the House)
• Historian (in charge of compiling the history of the House)
• Chaplain of the House (religious leader and counselor of the House)
• Legal Counselors (the lawyers and legal advisers of the House)
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The Minority Leader
• The Minority Leader in the House is the ranking, and elected leader, of the
minority party, or the party with less members in the House.
• The Minority Leader in the House is the ranking, and elected leader, of the
minority party, or the party with less members in the House.
• Each party has its own “club” of its members that meet and vote on priorities,
and leadership of their party in the House. These “clubs” are called caucuses.
Each party caucus votes for their leader, in the majority party that leader most
often becomes the Speaker of the House, the leader of the minority party is the
Minority Leader
• The current Minority Leader was the former Speaker of the House,
Nancy Pelosi
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The Majority Leader
• Although the title is Majority Leader, he is actually the second in charge of the
majority party, and the Speaker’s top assistant.
• The responsibilities of the Majority Leader include:
• Scheduling the House Floor’s legislative calendar
• Assisting the Speaker when need be
• The current Majority Leader is Eric Cantor
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The Whips
• The Majority Whip is the third in charge of the majority party in the House
• His or her duties include keeping track of all legislation and ensuring that all
party members are present when important measures are to be voted upon.
Republican Majority Whip
Kevin McCarthy
Democrat Minority Whip
Steny Hoyer
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The Committees
• The House of Representatives has four types of committees:
standing, select, conference, and joint committees.
• Standing Committees are permanent committees that determine whether
proposed legislation should be presented to the entire House
• The best-known standing committees are National Security,
International Relations, Rules, and Ways and Means in the House.
• Select Committees are also known as special committees. Unlike standing
committees, these are temporary and are established to examine specific
issues. They must be reestablished with each new Congress. The purpose of
select committees is to investigate matters that have attracted widespread
attention, such as illegal immigration or drug use. They do not propose
legislation but issue a report at the conclusion of their investigation. If a
problem becomes an ongoing concern, Congress may decide to change the
status of the committee from select to standing.
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The Committees
• The House of Representatives has four types of committees:
standing, select, conference, and joint committees.
• Conference Committees deal with legislation that has been passed by each of
both houses of Congress. The two bills may be similar, but they are seldom
identical. The function of the conference committee is to iron out the
differences. Members of both the House and Senate who have worked on the
bill in their respective standing committees serve on the conference
committee. It usually takes just a few days for them to come up with the final
wording of the legislation. The bill is then reported out of the conference
committee and is voted on by both the House and the Senate.
• Joint Committees have members from both houses, with the leadership
rotating between Senate and House members. They focus on issues of general
concern to Congress and investigate problems but do not propose legislation.
The Joint Economic Committee, for example, examines the nation's economic
policies.
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The Committees
• The complexity of lawmaking means that committee work must be divided
among subcommittees, smaller groups that focus more closely on the issues and
draft the bills.
• The standing committees in the House are:
Agriculture
Rules
Appropriations
Science, Space, and Technology
Armed Services
Small Business
Budget
Transportation and Infrastructure
Education and the Workforce
Veterans’ Affairs
Energy and Commerce
Ways and Means
Ethics
Intelligence
Financial Services
Foreign Affairs
Homeland Security
House Administration
Judiciary
Natural Resources
Oversight and Government Reform
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The Committees
• Committees are led by Chairmen, who have a lot of power in the House of
Representatives as they control what is introduced, and what happens within
their committees.
• Committee membership is determined by the Speaker and the Minority Leader,
who when they meet decide how many members of each party should be on
each committee. If they were to disagree, then the issue would go before the
entire House to determine.
• Then, each party caucus meets to determine who will serve on each committee
• The party caucus also determines who will be the Chairman of each committee,
in most cases that is determined by who the senior member from the majority
party on that committee is. Seniority is determined by how long you have served
on that committee, not how long you have been in the House, or how old you
are.
* Organization of the House of Representatives
• The Rules
• House members engage in two main activities in their role as our
representatives;
• Debate, and
• Submitting laws
• Each of these activities is controlled by a complex set of rules established by the
House itself, known as their Parliamentary Procedure, which is a series of
motions, voting procedures and customs that allows for the following:
• Maintain orderly meetings
• Enable majority rule
• Protect the rights of the minority
• Expedite business
• An in-depth knowledge of parliamentary procedure allows a lawmaker to
navigate through the debate and lawmaking process with relative ease, and get
more accomplished.