by Tom Ontis

Created on: August 17, 2008

In a representative democracy, such as ours, Congress is meant to represent the views of the people that elected them. Members of both the House of Representatives and the United States Senate are elected by popular vote of the districts and states they represent. A little known provision for those running for House seats: Though they must live in the state of which they are candidates, they do not have to live in the district that they eventually hope to represent. A candidate from San Francisco can run for a seat in a district in Los Angeles.

I had a history teacher way back in the 8th grade that told us that members of the House spend the first year looking for the bathroom and their second year concentrating on getting re-elected. Laugh laugh.

Members of both houses of Congress sit on a number of committees and sub-comittees. They hear witnesses on potential legislation either from representives of the Administration or from expert witnesses in the professional or academic community. The probelm is this though: Whichever party is in the majority controls the committees and they generally only hear witnesses that are sympathetic to their feelings on the legislation. Even though members of the minority party receive staff and some budget money, they often lack the power to call witnesses to testify. It works that way on both sides of the aisle.

Most of the work of the Congress is done in committee. What we see on C-SPAN is work that has come from the various committees. And quite often what we see is not a vote on the issue itself, it is a vote on a procedural motion, like moving to insert or remove wording-an amendment, or to table the motion until another time. The House of Rpresentatives, made up of 435 representatives from the states based upon population of that state, meet often as a 'Committee of the Whole' to 'debate' proposed legislation. An ongoing debate very seldom changes the mind of a member. Most often the vote on a bill is strictly along party lines.

The business of the House of Representatives is conducted, in name, by the Speaker of the House, who is the leader of the majority party (Nancy Pelosi as I write-8/17/08.) In reality the business of the day is conducted by a person designated by the Speaker, a member of the Speaker's party. In reality too, the Speaker comes in at the beginning of the day's business and opens the session.

Many members of Congress also spend a lot of time in their districts. For representatives from the northern part

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