PS 201 Introduction to US Politics
Joseph Boland Fall, 1998

 

Congress Lecture 1 Notes

 

  1. How representative is Congress?
    1. The notion of Congress as the "people's branch"--the most democratic branch of the national government
    2. Paine and other popular democrats of the early American republic believed in legislative sovereignty, the concentration of political power in a popularly elected legislature.
    3. The Pennsylvania constitution of 1776 as an example. Recall that it included:
      1. A unicameral legislature;
      2. Annual elections with term limits (no one allowed to hold office more than 4 years out of 7);
      3. Elimination of single executive-executive council of 12, with very limited powers;
      4. Made the people themselves a check on legislative power-open meetings, plus no bill could become law until the next session, enabling people to reject laws by electing new representatives.
    4. What they got was far less than this:
      1. A bicameral legislature, with only one house popularly elected (until 1913, senators were chosen by state legislatures).
      2. Power divided among the three branches of government, with specific provisions to limit legislative power:
        1. The presidential veto;
        2. Judicial review.
  2. Elite democracy in Congressional elections
    1. The rise of incumbency and decline of competitive elections
      1. As parties declined in the twentieth century, candidate centered elections emerged
      2. Serving in Congress became a career, including various career ladders:
        1. the seniority system provided long-term incumbents powerful committee chairs;
        2. one could hope to move up from House to Senate to President.
        3. The revolving door promised lucrative jobs in the private sector.
      3. See chart "Congress Becomes a Career in the Twentieth Century" (not available online).
      4. See table, "The Power of Incumbency" (not available online).
      5. Why are incumbents usually successful?
        1. Money. Typical incumbents hold a huge advantage over challengers in campaign fundraising.
          1. See chart, "Challengers are Falling Farther and Farther Behind..." (not available online).
        2. Incumbency privileges. Incumbents derive powerful benefits from serving in Congress:
          1. Staffs. The personal staffs of representatives and senators grew enormously from the 1960s until the late 1980s. House members' now employ an average of 18 persons on their staffs; Senators even more. About 40 percent of House staff are assigned to district offices.
          2. The franking privilege. Members of Congress can send mass mailings to constituents without having to pay postage.
            1. After reaching a peak of over 900 million pieces of mail in the mid-1980s, the franking privilege was restricted by recent Congresses. Mailings declined to about 450 million in 1992.
          3. The permanent campaign and influence peddling. The permanent campaign has both a public and a private side. Publicly, members of Congress seek to keep themselves continually on display before the voters for their accomplishments, especially those that benefit their state or district. Privately, they are constantly engaged in fundraising efforts, which itself frequently amounts to accepting contributions from powerful interest groups or individual corporations in exchange for favorable votes and treatment. Obviously, only incumbents are in a position to offer such services to contributors.
          4. It has been estimated that the free resources available to incumbents amounts to as much as a million dollars a year (Fiorina and Peterson 1998, 355).
    2. The demographics of representation
      1. Congress is predominantly white, male, and wealthy. Most Congresspersons are lawyers or businesspersons. Some of this-gender and racial composition-is changing, but very slowly
      2. See chart "The Presence of Women and Minorities in Congress..." (not available online).
        1. The 105th House (1996-97) had
          1. 51 women - 11.7 percent whereas women make up 51.3 percent of the population
          2. 37 African-American - 8.5 percent versus 12.1 percent of population
          3. 18 Hispanic - 4.1 percent versus 9.0 percent of population (1990 census)
        2. Why are women under-represented?
          1. Prejudice against women? Apparently not. Survey data show that most voters are willing to vote for otherwise qualified candidates who are women; and when women do run they are as likely to win as men are, other things being equal (Berg 1994, 98).
          2. The power of incumbency. Long tenure in office by current, mostly male, officeholders means that opportunities for women to run for open seats are sparse. This is certainly a partial explanation. However:
            1. Women are also under-represented as candidates. In 1992, for example, only 38 women ran as Democratic or Republican nominees for the 86 open seats. Overall, only 1/8th of all candidates in 1992 were women.
          3. Why are women under-represented as candidates?
            1. Political apprenticeship theory. One explanation is that winning a seat in Congress is usually the result of a series of successful efforts, beginning with a local office or community organization and progressing through state office. Along the way, the prospective member of Congress learns the art of politics and builds networks of supporters and contributors. According to apprenticeship theory, women are making rapid progress in this area.
            2. Patriarchal division of household labor theory. According to this view, the "unequal division of labor in the household makes it harder for women than for men to find the resources to run" (Berg 1994, 100). Women are more likely to resolve conflicts between family and public life by giving up or postponing involvement in the latter. Moreover, in most political families, children are affected by a mother's campaign far more than be a father's political activities.
        3. Why are minorities under-represented?
          1. Racial minorities, particularly African-Americans and Latinos, suffer from the consequences of racial block voting, whereby racial groups tend to vote as blocks.
            1. In the 103rd Congress, for example (the first Congress after the redistricting following the 1990 census), 32 of the 39 black members can from districts in which African-Americans were in the majority, and in five of the remaining seven districts African-Americans plus Latinos made up a majority. Similarly, 15 of the 17 Latino members came from majority Latino districts; none came from districts with a white majority.
          2. The 1982 amendments to the Voting Rights Act and subsequent court decisions have been interpreted to require the creation of majority-minority districts wherever possible in an effort to overcome the effects of block voting. This entails drawing district boundaries to create as many districts as possible in which a racial or ethnic constitutes the majority of the population.
          3. This approach to redistricting has become enmeshed in major party politics. It has appealed to Republicans as a way to concentrate some of the Democratic party's loyalist supporters in a few urban districts while weakening Democrats in a larger number of suburban districts. There is some evidence to suggest that Democrats might have won control of the House after the 1990 redistricting were it not for the number of majority-minority districts.
          4. In addition, the Supreme Court, initially a proponent of majority-minority redistricting, has recently backtracked, even referring to a plan proposed by Georgia as a "racial gerrymander." It appears that the Court will no longer permit race to be the predominant factor in redistricting.
          5. Changing to an electoral system based on proportional representation (PR) would solve this problem, because in PR systems minorities (whether racial or ideological) receive representation in proportion to the number of votes for parties or candidates representing them. However, PR is controversial and, for the moment at least, has very little, if any, momentum as a reform project.

References

Berg, John C. 1994. Unequal Struggle: Class, Gender, Race, and Power in the U.S. Congress. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

Fiorina, Morris P. and Paul E. Peterson. 1998. The New American Democracy. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon.