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During the semester, I shall post course material and students will comment on it. Students are also free to comment on any aspect of American politics, either current or historical. There are only two major limitations: no coarse language, and no derogatory comments about people at the Claremont Colleges. This blog is on the open Internet, so post nothing that you would not want a potential employer to see. Syllabus: http://gov20h.blogspot.com/2023/08/draft-introduction-to-american-politics.html

Wednesday, October 5, 2022

Congress II

 For Monday


How is Congress representative?

  • The average age of Members of the House at the beginning of the 117th Congress was 58.4 years; of Senators, 64.3 years.
  • The overwhelming majority, 96%, of Members of Congress have a college education.
  • The dominant professions of Members are public service/politics, business, and law.
  • Most Members identify as Christians, and the collective majority of these affiliate with a Protestant denomination. Roman Catholics account for the largest single religious denomination, and numerous other affiliations are represented, including Jewish, Mormon, Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu, Greek Orthodox, Pentecostal Christian, Unitarian Universalist, and Adventist.
  •  The average length of service for Representatives at the beginning of the 117thCongress was 8.9 years (4.5 House terms); for Senators, 11.0 years (1.8 Senate terms).
  • One hundred forty-seven women serve in the 117thCongress: 123 in the House, including 3 Delegates and the Resident Commissioner, and 24 in the Senate.
  • There are 57 African American Members of the House and 3 in the Senate. This House number includes two Delegates.
  • There are 54 Hispanic or Latino Members (a record number) serving: 47 in the House, including 2 Delegates and the Resident Commissioner, and 7 in the Senate.
  • There are 21 Members (16 Representatives, 3 Delegates, and 2 Senators) who are Asian Americans or Pacific Islander Americans.
  • A record five Native Americans (American Indians or Native Hawaiians) serve in the House.


The House of Representatives is so constituted as to support in the members an habitual recollection of their dependence on the people. Before the sentiments impressed on their minds by the mode of their elevation can be effaced by the exercise of power, they will be compelled to anticipate the moment when their power is to cease, when their exercise of it is to be reviewed, and when they must descend to the level from which they were raised; there forever to remain unless a faithful discharge of their trust shall have established their title to a renewal of it. I will add, as a fifth circumstance in the situation of the House of Representatives, restraining them from oppressive measures, that they can make no law which will not have its full operation on themselves and their friends, as well as on the great mass of the society.

Federalist 63:

As the cool and deliberate sense of the community ought, in all governments, and actually will, in all free governments, ultimately prevail over the views of its rulers; so there are particular moments in public affairs when the people, stimulated by some irregular passion, or some illicit advantage, or misled by the artful misrepresentations of interested men, may call for measures which they themselves will afterwards be the most ready to lament and condemn. In these critical moments, how salutary will be the interference of some temperate and respectable body of citizens, in order to check the misguided career, and to suspend the blow meditated by the people against themselves, until reason, justice, and truth can regain their authority over the public mind? What bitter anguish would not the people of Athens have often escaped if their government had contained so provident a safeguard against the tyranny of their own passions? Popular liberty might then have escaped the indelible reproach of decreeing to the same citizens the hemlock on one day and statues on the next.

BUT DOES THE SYSTEM WORK WITH POLARIZED AND NATIONALIZED  PARTIES? 

Boehner & Bachmann

There are bipartisan bills:  Franken and service dogs

BESIDES PASSING BILLS, MEMBERS OF CONGRESS:
  • SERVE AS CONSTITUENT CONCIERGES
  • MAKE APPEARANCES IN THE CONSTITUENCY
  • MAKE SPEECHES
  • DO MEDIA INTERVIEWS
  • ISSUE PRESS RELEASES AND SOCIAL MEDIA POSTS
  • HOLD HEARINGS:  FRANKEN REFLECTIONS
  • CONDUCT OVERSIGHT 
Legal basis for investigations

The executive branch ignores subpoenas.  What then?




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Thinking about Congress, the presidency, emergencies, and foreign policy

Presidents and Emergency Powers

Governors actually have primary responsibility.

Tocqueville:

Now, it is this clear perception of the future, based on judgment and experience, which must often be lacking in a democracy. The people feel more strongly than they reason; and if present ills are great, it is to be feared that they will forget the greater evils that perhaps await them in case of defeat (p. 223).
[The] great privilege enjoyed by the Americans is not only to be more enlightened than other nations but also to have the chance to make mistakes that can be retrieved (p. 225).

 One kind of mistake, however, is not retrievable.

The steps in launching a nuclear attack.
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