~ most work of Congress is completed in committees
~ Congress uses committees to divide the workload and get more accomplished
~ most bills die in committee
~ for every 10,000 bills introduced, only about 500-600 pass and become
law
I. Types of Committees
A. Standing: permanent cttes. that
handle bill pertaining to particular topics
1. subcommittees: smaller
groups within standing cttes the specialize even further
B. Select: temporary ctte. that forms to handle
special topics (like terrorism)
C. Joint: ctte. that contains members of
both houses
1. conference ctte: members
of both houses meet to iron out differences in bills
passed by both houses
II. Committe Leadership
A. majority party will have a majority on
every ctte (this majority will be proportional
to the majority the party
has in that chamber)
B. Chairperson: leader of the ctte; member
of the majority party; controls the agenda of the
ctte; usually the majority
party member with the most seniority on the ctte.
C. Ranking Member: longest-serving ctte.
member of the minority party (leads the minority
party in the ctte much like
the minority leader leads the party in the HOR or Senate)