2. Congress

Question 1

Congress

Answer 1

Bicameral legislature with two equal legislative bodies

Question 2

What are the two legislative bodies in Congress?

Answer 2

• The House of Representatives
• The Senate

Question 3

How does the House provide representation?

Answer 3

Awards political representation based on the size of their population

Ex: California will have more seats than Wyoming

Question 4

How does the Senate provide representation?

Answer 4

Each state is awarded 2 senators

Question 5

How long are the terms for the House of Representatives?

Answer 5

2 years

Question 6

How long are the terms for the senate?

Answer 6

6 years

Question 7

How many seats are in the House of Representatives?

Answer 7

435

Question 8

How many seats are in the Senate?

Answer 8

100

Question 9

Mid-term elections

Answer 9

Congressional and state-based elections held mid way through a President’s four-year term

Question 10

How many classes are the Senate divided up into?

Answer 10

3

Question 11

What do the 3 classes of the Senate decide?

Answer 11

Which seats will be up for election in any two year cycle, as one third of the Senate is up for election during presidential elections and mid-terms - (1/3 being elected every 2 years)

Question 12

Why can the majority in either chamber change every 2 years?

Answer 12

• Congressional elections take place every 2 years in November
• All members of the House are on the ballot
• In addition to this, 1/3 of the members of the Senate are also on the ballot, as they are

Question 13

Concurrent Powers

Answer 13

Powers granted to both the House of Representatives and the Senate

Question 14

Why are concurrent powers so important?

Answer 14

They allow for even more checks and balances and power sharing - Which help ensure that one branch does not become too powerful

Question 15

What are the concurrent powers of Congress?

Answer 15

• Legislate
• Representation
• Amending the Constitution
• Declaring War

Question 16

Which powers are exclusive to the House of Representatives?

Answer 16

• Introducing impeachment cases
• Elect the President if no candidate has over 50% of Electoral College votes
• Introduce financial bills

Question 17

Why do the House of Representatives have more power over financial legislation than the Senate?

Answer 17

• Founding Fathers decided to give the House, the only elected chamber at the time, more influence over taxation than the Senate

Question 18

Which powers are exclusive to the Senate?

Answer 18

• Ratifies foreign treaties negotiated by the President
• Elect the Vice President if no candidate has over 50% of the Electoral College votes
• Try and impeachment case
• Confirm executive appointments

Question 19

What is the vote needed for the Senate to impeach/remove someone from office?

Answer 19

2/3

Question 20

Which chamber is seen as being more prestigious?

Answer 20

• The Senate
• Members of the House leave in order to seek election to the Senate
• However, members of the Senate don’t leave to seek election to the House

Question 21

Why is the Senate seen as the more prestigious chamber?

POTENTIALLY TRY AND REFINE THIS FLASHCARD

Answer 21

• Longer terms - House members are constantly having to focus on fundraisers and election campaigns due to frequent elections, whereas Senate members have more breathing room and can therefore focus on effective scrutiny and legislation - Can raise their profile
• Senates serve an entire state, which means that they have far greater name recognition + It could be argued they have a larger mandate, as they recieved more voters
• Senates can use filibusters, which is extremely important, because the Senate, unlike the House, allows for unlimited debate - The Senate also needs a supermajority of 60 members to prevent filibustering - This gives the vote of each individual even more weight than in the House
• Exclusive powers given to the Senate are more significant than the ones given to the house

Question 22

What are the 3 main functions of Congress?

Answer 22

1. Representation
2. Legislative
3. Oversight

Question 23

What are the different ways that Congress can perform it’s representative function?

Answer 23

• Descriptively representative
• Democratically representative

Question 24

Substantive Representation

Answer 24

Refers to how well members of Congress will act on behalf of numerous diverse groups in their constitutency

**How effective they are representing people who are descriptively different from themselves*

Question 25

What are the main arguments for descriptive representation being a good thing?

Answer 25

* Influences how much Congress is trusted by voters * Impact on Political participation - If there are only male congress members, then women may be less likely to participate in Political voting - (As there is little point in participating in) * Influences the types of issues raised in Congress - The more groups are represented, the more diverse issues Congress can try and solve - Which means that minority groups' interests would not be marginalised * Research pointing to Diverse groups being better at problem solving

Question 26

In the 114th Congress, (Jan 3rd 2015-Jan 2nd 2017), how many congresswomen were there?

Answer 26

104 **Out of the 450 seats*

Question 27

What % of the American population in 2017, (during the 114th Congress), were women?

Answer 27

51%

Question 28

In the 114th Congress, (Jan 3rd 2015-Jan 2nd 2017), how many congress members were part of minority groups?

Answer 28

91 **Out of the 450 seats*

Question 29

How many women were members of Congress in 1979-1980?

Answer 29

16 **Out of 450 seats*

Question 30

How many women were Senators in 1979-1980?

Answer 30

0

Question 31

How many women were members of Congress in 2015-2016?

Answer 31

104 **Out of 450 seats*

Question 32

In the 114th Congress, how many women held leadership roles across both the Republican and Democrat parties?

Answer 32

1 **Out of 10 leadership roles* - 5 per party

Question 33

How many senators in 2015-2016 were African-American?

Answer 33

2 **Out of 100 seats*

Question 34

Why did the racial descriptive representation of congress improve in the 1990s?

Answer 34

* Article 1, Section II of the Constitution states that a count of the entire population is to be undertaken for the purpose of keeping the House representative * After the 1990 census, many states lost or gained seats in Congress, which caused them to redraw the boundaries of congressional districts * As these districts were re-drawn, numerous districts that consisted of a majority of minority citizens were drawn

Question 35

After the 1990 census, how many African-American majority districts were created?

Answer 35

15

Question 36

Are there limits to redrawing boundary lines to improve descriptive representation? If so, what are they?

Answer 36

* There are limits * The Supreme Court ruled that using race as the sole factor when drawing district lines would undermine the 14th amendment, Equal Protection Clause

Question 37

Example of the Supreme Court ruling against drawing new district lines to try and improve descriptive representation?

Answer 37

* Bush vs Vera 1996 * The Supreme Court struck down 'Texas' 30th District' because of it's ridiculous shape * They believed that this ridiculous shape was designed specifically to create a district that had a majority population of ethnic minority citizens