Advocacy Action Center
About Congress
Understanding the audience is critical to effective advocacy. Following are some basic details on members of Congress as well as the legislative process that may be useful to advocates as they develop their messages.
Before communicating with a member of Congress, advocates should be able to answer a few key questions, as follows
| Questions
to Ask |
Answers
& Resources for Activists |
| Whose district or state am I in? | Almost every American has one House Representative and two Senators. House Members represent discrete districts based on population. Senators represent entire states. You are relevant to your Representative or Senator because you live or work in the area they represent. In fact, one of the most common questions heard in a Congressional office is "are they from the district?" So go ahead -- use your power of constituency. For the House, you can easily identify, find the webpage for, and e-mail your representative from the House "WriteYour Rep." site. Or try Congress.org For the Senate, go to the Senate home page and select your state -- it's that easy! |
| What is the Member's Legislative Record? | Before sending a letter, calling, or asking for a visit, know where he or she stands on your issues. Also, know what issues your member cares passionately about. Being able to present your views in terms your member understands and agrees with will help you get the most out of your interaction with the office. There are four key ways to learn more about your elected officials' position on key issues: 1) U se PMA's " Take action movie" center to access information about your elected officials (including how they've vote on key issues) 2) Track down your Representative's and Senators' websites through the House and Senate sites. These will give you an excellent idea of the kinds of things your member cares about. 3) Look up legislation you member of Congress has sponsored at www.congress.gov. If a member of Congress introduces legislation on a topic, it usually means that the issue is important to him or her, 4) Review CRS reports on tracking federal legislation and legislative procedure. These reports are available to the public through the House Rules Committee
|
| What Committee/ Committees is My Member on? | Members are assigned to committees based on their interests, their districts (or states, in the case of the Senate), and, for the more competitive major committees, on how long they have served (seniority). A member’s ability to influence legislation depends largely upon whether he or she is a member of the committee of jurisdiction. Again, the House and Senate sites are great resources for tracking down Committees. The key committees for PMA advocacy efforts are as follows: House Appropriations Committee (subcommittee on Agriculture) Senate Appropriations Committee (subcommittee on Agriculture) The home pages of committees, which are accessible from the main site, will give you an idea of Committee jurisdictions as well as membership. For more detailed information about the history and function of Committees, check the House Rules Committee page on Committees. To learn more about Committees, check out CongressLink, a site designed for those brave people who teach about political science. In addition to great general information, there's a module on Committee procedures and structure. |
| What Party does he or she Belong to? | Members help all constituents, not just those who are members of their political party (as some people believe). After all, your representative has been elected to represent you and your interests, regardless of your party affiliation. But it is important to know the member’s party affiliation to determine if they are part of the majority or minority party in Congress. While many members are seeking to work collaboratively and across party lines, members of the majority party still have an advantage in efforts to get legislative proposals passed. Party affiliation is available through the House and Senate sites |
| Great General Sites! | The Library of Congress has a great general site with access to e-mail address, webpages, schedules, and telephone numbers for individual members and Committees. The Clerk of the House has biographical, district, party, and general historical and statistical information about the House and some about the Senate as well. |
Basics
of the
Legislative Process
The process by which a bill becomes a law is very involved and highly inefficient. As a result, very few pieces of legislation ultimately become law. In fact, an average of only 5% of the 10,000 to 12,000 bills that are introduced in a Congress become law.
The key steps to understand are as follows (please note that this is a very basic overview):
Click here for a Glossary
1) Legislation is introduced by a Representative or Senator
2) The legislation is referred to one or more committees and subcommittees by the parliamentarian. Bills introduced in the House are sent to House Committees and subcommittees, and bills introduced in the Senate are sent to Senate Committees and subcommittees.
3) The subcommittee considers the legislation by holding special sessions where witnesses provide testimony about the legislation. These sessions are called hearings.
4) The subcommittee “marks-up” the legislation. In a “mark-up” session, the various members of the subcommittee decide what changes they would like to make to the bill. Controversial changes are voted on.
5) Once the bill has been “marked-up”, the subcommittee prepares a report about the bill explaining why they made the changes they did, and sends the bill to the full Committee for consideration.
6) The full Committee may or may not hold its own set of hearings.
7) The full Committee also holds a “markup” session, and then sends the bill to the entire House or Senate.
8) The entire House or Senate considers the legislation, and then members vote for or against passage.
9) After the bill is passed in one body (either the House or Senate), the other body has to consider the same bill.
10) If both bodies have passed the same legislation with minor differences, they resolve those differences in a conference committee (a special committee formed to resolve difference in House and Senate passed bills)
11) Once both bodies have passed the exact same versions of the legislation, the bill is sent to the President for signature or to be vetoed.
You
can find out more about the legislative process on the House web site
at http://thomas.loc.gov/home/holam.txt.
This is a link to a comprehensive e-booklet titled “How Our Laws
Are Made”.