17.251, Introduction to Congressional Politics

Fall 2012

Course syllabus, handouts, and assignments (These all require Adobe Acrobat Reader)

Syllabus Revised schedule Exercise I (for class on September 10) Problem set # 1: The assignment is to do the first five problems at the end of Chapter 1 of Analyzing Congress. Due MONDAY, Sept. 24, 2012 Problem set # 2: The assignment is to do the following problems at the end of Chapter 1 of Analyzing Congress. Questions 7, 8, 10, and 11. Due WEDNESDAY, Nov. 28, 2012Answer key The Paper assignment is due on December 7. Example midterm (from 2008) Midterm answer key

Lecture handouts
-Unidimensional spatial model
-Constitution
-Origins & development of Congress
-Congressional candidates
-Congressional voters
-Redistricting
-Campaign finance
-Multidimensional spatial model
--Fiscal cliff example
-Parties and leadership
-Committees
-Floor procedures and roll call voting

The University of Michigan library has a great resource page that points out sources for doing congressional research. Most of the sources that are linked to via this site are also available at MIT, but the overlap isn't 100%. One day, the MIT library will have a good Congress research page like this one.

The House of Representatives and the Senate have their own Web pages. Lots of stuff here.

Thomas, which is a service of the Library of Congress, is another great site.  Of particular interest is the Government Resources link.

The Government Printing Office is the go-to source for all federal government documents. Here are links to the most important congressional documents. As a general matter, the electronic versions of documents only go back to the 104th Congress (1995-96):

• Congressional bills
• Congressional Directory
• Congressional documents
• Congressional Hearings
• Congressional Records (1994 onward)
• Congressional reports
• Browse congressional committees

CQ, or Congressional Quarterly, has been providing first-hand accounts of congressional activities since the late 1940s. CQ split a few years ago, so that the press and the journalistic organization are no longer owned by the same entity. This can cause confusion sometimes. However, there is nothing denying the fact that CQ products, produced by both organizations that carry the name, remain the premier independent voice covering what happens on Capitol Hill, and around the nation politically. Here is a list of indispensible publications carried by MIT libraries online. You can get paper copies of these publications for the period before electronic publication.

• CQ Weekly provides weekly coverage of Congress.
• CQ Almanac aggregates the weekly into an annual compilation. This online source is incredible.
• Congress and the Nation aggregates the almanacs into a volume that covers a presidential term.
• CQ Researcher Online provides great research memos about every policy topic under the sun.

Proquest Congressional is the online source that gains you access to congressional publications, including committee publications, that describe legislative action of all sorts. Included here are legislative histories, It is quite comprehensive, going back into the 19th century. A great source for all sorts of historical and conntemporary research into congressional policymaking. (This was formerly LexisNexis Congressional.)

The Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, online version is the best source, by far, of biographical information about everyone who has ever served in Congress. My only complaint is that you can't really browse the directory. For that, you'll have to hunt down a paper version of the document, which is full of information the online version doesn't have.

The Congressional Pictorial Directory gives you a picture of every members of Congress. This link sends you to the version for the 112th Congress. Search the GPO web site for other editions.

The Congressional Research Service (CRS) is Congress's "think tank," producing a huge volume of very useful reports on topics ranging from specific policies to the legislative process. Unfortunately, CRS doesn't make those reports available to the public. This has resulted in a network of libraries and web sites that try to acquire CRS reports and then make them available to the public. This site, at the University of Texas-Denton, is a great sources for these reports.

The Democratic caucus of the House Rules Committee hosts an indispensable site that gathers together the Congressional Research service reports on the legislative process.  This is the collection of information about the nuts and bolts of legislation. Unfortunately, these reports are now a bit out of date. However, they are generally very useful. If you do a Google Search on a report title that you find especially useful, you might find a more recently updated version.

Digitized and searchable fascimiles of early congressional documents is available at the Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation site. Totally cool! You can also search the House and Senate Journals up to the 42nd Congress (up to 1873), in addition to other documents.

The Center for Legislative Archives of the National Archives and Records Administration keeps old original congressional records that you can travel to DC to do research on. This site is also useful for doing research far away from D.C.

C-SPAN to see live television from the floor of the House and Senate

Roll Call is the "home town newspaper" of Capitol Hill. Information ranging from straight news to hometown gossip. The Hill is an upstart competitor that's a little edgier.

The Dirksen Center has created a site called CongressLink, which contains a mixture of good congressional links and academic exercises.

The Almanac of American Politics is a tremendous resource that gives detailed information about congressional districts, members of Congress, and local politics. This is perhaps my favorite reference book.

My own congressional data, including recent updates to my standing committee data.

The Dirksen Center honors the memory of Sen. Everett M. Dirksen. It has grants and educational programs that are of some interest to the professional and student, alike. Their CongressLink page has a lot of resources that are helpful to teachers and students of Congress.

Proquest: Congressional provides great access to the full text of congressional proceedings, reaching back at least 25 years. This provides direct access to most congressional documents. The link is available to MIT users only.

Keith Poole at the University of Georgia has the most interesting and useful roll call information up and running for recent years at his Voteview site. There is a more direct link to his NOMINATE data download page.

While it's not data -- it's software -- the PoliSim election simulator provides a pretty neat visualization of how spatial models of electoral competition work. (The page is now about 16 years old and written in Java 1.0. Please take the fellow up on his challenge to update it.)

The Legislative Studies Section of the American Political Science Association has its own home page, including the electronic version of its newsletter and other legislative links.

The Legislative Studies Quarterly is the official journal of the Legislative Studies Section. It's a highly-respected journal, and contains the most current research on legislatures of all types. You can access back issues through JSTOR. You must consult current issue the old fashioned way.