Congress - Poor At Legislation Flashcards
What percent of bills become laws? Give a reason why this happens
2-3% of bill becomes law due to partisanship and hyper polarisation
What do Chairs of Committee act as and what do they do? Where do most of them come from?
Act as ‘gatekeepers’ and they block the passage of legislation and most come from white conservative southern states
What do the rules committee do?
Act as a gatekeeper as it decides what bills are debated and come to the floor votes
What Congress (number and years) was the least productive? Give the number of laws and bills passed
112th Congress (2011-2013) only passed 284 bills and 57 laws)
How many roll call votes in 2013 in the senate and the House? How many times did the House vote to repeal Obamacare and why were they frustrated?
Congress held roll calls with little effect consisting of 291 in the Senate and 641 in the House.
House voted 12 times that year to repeal Obamacare, which was frustrated by the Senate’s refusal to agree.
Congress 2015-16 passed how many pieces of legislation and what did they include?
2015-2016 Congress passed 139 pieces of legislation but some of these were to rename post offices, to award Congressional medals etc.
What committee has declined in the last 20 years?
Conference committee
What percentage of executive veto’s have been overturned by Congress and what approval rate does this give the President? What does Congress need to overturn a Presidential veto?
Only 8% of executive vetoes have been overturned by Congress; giving the Presidents of the US a 92% success rate. Need 2/3rds to overturn a Presidential veto.
When was there a lack of override but Congress still refused something a President wanted?
Trump vetoed the Iran War Powers Resolution (May 2020) – modern example of lack of override but Congress refused to allow Trump to repeal Obamacare
When was Congress unable to come to an agreement overfunding?
Zika virus
