How Congress is Organized The terms of Congress have been numbered in order since the first Congress met in 1789. The 114th Congress was sworn in in January 2015. The two-­‐year terms of Congress are divided into one year “sessions.” Sessions of Congress begin in January and usually end in October or November. I.
Leadership in Congress The leader of the House of Representatives is called the Speaker of the House. The Speaker today is Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin. He was chosen to be Speaker by the Republican majority in October 2015, replacing the former Speaker, John Boehner of Ohio who recently announced his resignation. Also according to the Constitution, the Vice President of the United States serves as the president of the Senate. However, this is really just an honorary position. The longest-­‐
serving member of the majority party in the Senate is the President pro tempore, officially the highest-­‐ranking member of the Senate. In reality this is also just an honorary position. The real leader of the Senate is the majority floor leader. He or she is assisted by the whip, who is the assistant floor leader. It is the job of the majority leader and the whip to round up votes from their party members on important bills. Today, the majority leader in the Senate is Senator Mitch McConnell, a Republican. There is also a minority leader and a minority whip, the leaders of the party with fewer members than the majority. Today, that is the Democratic Party. Working in Committees Both the House and the Senate are divided up into a system of committees. Members serve on two or three committees, which become their areas of expertise. Most of the lawmaking process takes place in committees. There are a number of different types of Congressional committees: 1. Standing Committees When a bill is introduced in the House or Senate, it is referred to a standing committee for further work. The standing committees are permanent, lawmaking bodies. There are currently 20 standing committees in the Senate and 23 in the House. They deal with broad areas of policy, such as education, energy, or banking. The standing committees are further divided into a number of subcommittees. These subcommittees hold public hearings when considering a bill and are responsible for writing the final language of the bill. Every committee has both Republican and Democratic members, but the majority party always has more members on each committee and the chairman of each committee is always a member of the majority party. 2. Select and Joint Committees Select Committees are not legislative (lawmaking) committees. Instead, they are temporary investigative committees formed in order to study a particular issue or problem not covered by one of the standing committees. Joint Committees are committees made up of members from both the House and Senate. Joint committees are usually select committees, although there are permanent joint committees as well. They are advisory rather than legislative committees. Conference Committees are joint committees (members from both House and Senate). Bills that have passed through the House and Senate in different forms must be “reconciled” (combined into one final version) in a conference committee before being sent to the President for his signature. Senate Committees House Committees II.
The President’s Role Once a bill has been approved by both the House and Senate, it is sent to the President for his approval. When presented with a bill, the President can do one of four things: Sign it (it becomes law); Veto it (rejects it—veto can be overridden by a 2/3 vote in both Houses of Congress); Take no action (it becomes law after ten days even without his signature); Pocket Veto (if he takes no action on a bill and there are less than ten days left in the session of Congress, it is a veto and it cannot be overridden). I'm Just a Bill