Topic_4_Lesson_2_Notes_Completed

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Name:_________________________________ Period:_____ Date:___________ Topic 4 Lesson 2 Notes: The House  Size of House o The exact size of the House of Representatives—today, 435 members—is not fixed by the Constitution o The Constitution provides that the total number of seats in the House of Representatives shall be apportioned among the States on the basis of their respective populations  Terms for Representatives o Article I, Section 2, Clause 1 of the Constitution provides that “Representatives shall be . . . chosen every second Year”—that is, they are elected for two-year terms. o There is no constitutional limit on the number of terms any member of Congress may serve Reapportionment of Congress  A growing Nation o Article I of the Constitution directs Congress to reapportion the seats in the House every ten years, after each census o With the census of 1920, The House had long since grown too large for effective floor action. o To reapportion without adding more seats, however, would mean that some States would have to lose seats. o Congress met the problem by doing nothing  Reapportionment act of 1929 o Reapportionment Act of 1929. That law, still on the books, sets up what is often called an “automatic reapportionment.” o The “permanent” size of the House is 435 members. o Following each census, the Census Bureau is to determine the number of seats each State should have. o When the Bureau’s plan is ready, the President must send it to Congress. o If, within 60 days of receiving it, neither house rejects the Census Bureau’s plan, it becomes effective  Congressional Districts o Seven States each have only one seat in the House. There are, then, 428 congressional districts within the other 43 States. o Congress allowed each State to decide whether to elect its members by a general ticket system or on a single-member district basis.  electoral district from which one person is chosen by the voters for each elected office

Name:_________________________________ Period:_____ Date:___________ o Several States used the general ticket system. Under that arrangement, all of the State’s seats were filled at-large  election of an officeholder by the voters of an entire governmental unit (e.g. a State or country) rather than by the voters of a district or subdivision o Congress finally did away with the general ticket system in 1842. o The 1842 law gave each State legislature the responsibility for drawing congressional districts within its own State o It also required that each congressional district be made up of “contiguous territory.”  That is, it must be one piece, not several scattered pieces o In 1872, Congress added the command that the districts within each State have “as nearly as practicable an equal number of inhabitants.” o In 1901, it further directed that all the districts be of “compact territory”  in other words, a comparatively small area. o State legislatures have drawn many districts with very peculiar geographic shapes. o Moreover, until fairly recently, many districts were also of widely varying populations.  Gerrymandering o Gerrymandering: the drawing of electoral district lines to the advantage of a party or group o Most often gerrymandering takes one of two forms. o The lines are drawn either  (1) to concentrate the opposition’s voters in one or a few districts, thus leaving the other districts comfortably safe for the dominant party  (2) to spread the opposition as thinly as possible among several districts, limiting the opposition’s ability to win anywhere in the region.  Wesberry V. Sanders 1964 o the Supreme Court held that the Constitution demands that the States draw congressional districts of substantially equal populations. o “one person, one vote” o it remains quite possible for States to draw their congressional district lines in accord with the “one person, one vote” rule and, at the same time, gerrymander those districts. o Gerrymandering based solely on race, however, is a violation of the 15th Amendment, o Gomillion v. Lightfoot, 1960. So-called “majority-minority districts” were drawn in some States following the census in 1990 and again in 2000.  Partisan Gerrymandering

Name:_________________________________ Period:_____ Date:___________ o The Court has said that under some circumstances, which it has never spelled out, excessively partisan gerrymandering might be unconstitutional. o Texas became the first State to redistrict between censuses, with the purpose of increasing the number of Republican-held Texas seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. o In a dramatic showdown, the Republican governor called a special session of the legislature. o Democratic legislators fled the State, but ultimately they were unable to stop the redistricting. o a bare majority of the Court ruled that neither the Constitution nor any act of Congress prevents a State from redrawing its district lines whenever the party in control of the legislature believes that it might be to its advantage to do so House Elections  Setting the Date o Since 1872 Congress has required that those elections be held on the Tuesday following the first Monday in November of each even-numbered year. o Congress directed that representatives be chosen by written or printed ballots. The use of voting machines was approved in 1899  Off-Year Elections o Off Year Elections: congressional elections that occur in nonpresidential years o Far more often than not, the party that holds the presidency loses seats in the off- year elections Qualifications for Office in the House  Formal Qualifications o (1) be at least 25 years of age, (2) have been a citizen of the United States for at least 7 years, and (3) be an inhabitant of the State from which he or she is elected o Custom, not the Constitution, also requires that a representative must live in the district he or she represents. o when the right of a member-elect to be seated is challenged, the House has the power to decide the matter. Challenges are rarely successful. o The House may refuse to seat a member-elect by majority vote. o It may also “punish its Members for disorderly Behavior” by majority vote o And “with the Concurrence of two thirds, expel a Member”  Imposing Additional Standards o the House viewed its power to judge the qualifications of members-elect as the power to impose additional standards.  In 1900, it refused to seat Brigham H. Roberts of Utah because he was a polygamist

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Name:_________________________________ Period:_____ Date:___________ o In Powell v. McCormack, 1969, however, the Supreme Court held that the House could not exclude a member-elect who meets the Constitution’s standards of age, citizenship, and residence. o Over more than 200 years, the House has expelled only 5 members. o Over time, a few members have resigned to avoid almost certain expulsion. Thus, Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R., Calif.) resigned after pleading guilty to bribery charges in 2005.  Informal Qualifications o These informal qualifications have to do with a candidate’s vote-getting abilities o Being the incumbent, the person who currently holds the office, almost always helps. o Regularly, well over 90 percent of those members of the House who seek reelection do so successfully. The Senate: Size, Election, and Terms\  Senate Size o Nearly a third of the present members of the Senate once served in the House of Representatives o The Constitution says that the Senate “shall be composed of two senators from each State,” o The Framers hoped that the smaller Senate would be a more enlightened and responsible body than the House. Many of them thought that the House would be too often swayed by the immediate impact of events and by the passions of the moment o It is indispensable that besides the House of Representatives which runs on all fours with popular sentiment, we should have a body like the Senate which may refuse to run with it at all when it seems to be wrong—a body which has time and security enough to keep its head, if only now and then and but for a little while, till other people have had time to think.—Woodrow Wilson  Election to the Senate o Originally, the Constitution provided that the members of the Senate were to be chosen by the State legislatures. o Since the ratification of the 17th Amendment in 1913, however, senators have been picked by the voters in each State at the regular November elections. o The 17th Amendment declares that all persons whom the State allows to vote for members of “the most numerous Branch” (the larger house) of its legislature are automatically qualified to vote for candidates for the U.S. Senate.  Terms of Office o Senators serve for six-year terms o The Constitution puts no limit on the number of terms any senator may serve. T o he late Robert C. Byrd was first elected to the upper house in 1958 and holds the all-time record for length of service there—more than 51 years.

Name:_________________________________ Period:_____ Date:___________ o Continuous Body: governing unit (e.g. the United States Senate) whose seats are never all up for election at the same time o Those six years give senators some insulation from the rough-and-tumble of day- to-day politics. o The six-year term also tends to make senators less subject to the pressures of public opinion and less susceptible to the pleas of special interests than their colleagues in the House. o Constituencies: the people and interests that an elected official represents o Senators are supposed to be less concerned with the interests of some particular small locality and more focused on the “big picture” of national concerns Qualifications for Office in the Senate  (1) be at least 30 years of age, (2) have been a citizen of the United States for at least nine years, and (3) be an inhabitant of the State from which he or she is elected  Senators must satisfy a number of informal qualifications for office—various extralegal yardsticks based on such factors as party, name familiarity, gender, ethnic characteristics, and political experience.  The Senate can also judge the qualifications of its members when and if they are challenged, and it may exclude a member-elect by a majority vote  The upper house has refused to seat someone on three occasions.  Fifteen members of the Senate have been expelled by that body, one in 1797 and 14 during the Civil War.  Over time, a few senators have resigned in the face of almost certain expulsion. In 1995, the Senate’s Ethics Committee found that four-term Senator Bob Packwood (R., Oregon) had been involved in several instances of blatant sexual harassment, and it urged his dismissal.  The punishing of a senator for “disorderly Behaviour” has also been rare.  In the most recent case, in 1990, the Senate formally “denounced” Senator David Durenberger (R., Minnesota).  The Ethics Committee had found him guilty on several counts of financial misconduct.