well hey there and welcome back to H history in the last video I began talking about unit 2 of the AP Government curriculum namely the structures powers and functions of Congress and in this video we're going to do it again but we're going deeper so if you're ready to get them brain cows milk then let's get to it so in this video here's what we're trying to accomplish explain how the structure powers and functions of both houses of Congress affect the policymaking process and look just to warn you up front this is a big one so G thyself and let's jump in so the emphasis in this video is policymaking and how the structures of Congress affected and because the Senate and the house both have different structures and Powers policymaking is accomplished in different ways depending on which house you're in so first let's talk about the leadership structure in each house and just for poops and Giggles let's begin with the House of Representatives the Constitution only mentions one specific leadership position in the house and that's the speaker of the house and other than saying that the house member shall choose this leader doesn't say anything about what the speaker does however since this position is by the choice of the house which is to say the house members vote on this person that means the speaker of the house will always be a member of the majority party why well because if a party holds the majority in the house ain't no way they're going to vote for a leader in the other party now over time the house has made its own rules for itself and how the speaker will function and this has become a very powerful position in the house because the house follows parliamentary procedure to structure its work which is an elaborate system of rules for who can speak when and how the speaker has the power to recognize who can speak and who cannot additionally the speaker is the one who makes committee assignments and we're going to talk more about committees later but for now just understand that since everyone in the house is going to be in some committee and some are more desirable than others you want to be on the speaker's good side so you can get the better committee assignments okay now one rung below the speaker are the majority and minority leaders again these are not positions given to the house by the Constitution but they're important nonetheless these are the folks that guide their own party members and how to vote and other policymaking issues additionally the majority and minority leaders help direct debate and basically you just need to understand that party leaders want to make sure that their members are working together to achieve policy outcomes favorable to their party and leaders make sure that that's happening then below them you have the majority and minority whips and they're responsible for party disciplines like if ralat Tren party members are acting like turds and not Towing the party line or if representatives are not showing up for votes then the whip steps in and gets them back in line okay that's the basic leadership structure of the house so now let's consider the leadership of the Senate the Constitution actually mentions two leadership positions in the Senate and the first is the president of the Senate which is also the vice president of the United States now that sounds like a very lofty position you know like the president of the Senate you the more sure house in Congress but in reality the vice president has a lot of other stuff going on especially in Modern Times And so they're rarely present at the Senate so that brings us to the next Senate leadership position mentioned in the Constitution the president prot temporary although you most often hear this called the president protm the Constitution says that the senate members will choose the president protim and that means again that this will be a member of the majority party and this person leads the Senate when the vice president is away the next Senate leadership position you should know is the majority and minority leaders the majority leader has a great deal of power because he or she sets the legislative agenda by determining which bills reach the floor for debate and which do not and the main way the majority leader does this is by controlling the calendar assignments of bills the Senate calendar is what determines what bills and resolutions are awaiting debate and voting okay so now that we have the basic leadership structure for both houses of Congress down let's look at how each house actually gets its legislative work done and for that I need to tell you about committees both the Senate and the house use committees to get their work done and that's not because it's mandated in the Constitution but because it's more like a practical necessity committees are smaller groups of legislators who debate and draft precise legislation that would otherwise be impossible in the large group setting of either the house or the Senate now there are four species of committees that you need to know and first is the standing committee and you know as much as I'd like to tell you that they're called that because their members do all their work without sitting down that's not really what it is a standing committee is one which remains from congressional session to Congressional session like it's always there because those committees are dealing with issues that are always present an example of a standing committee in the Senate is the Appropriations Committee which is the largest and arguably the most powerful Committee in the Senate this group debates and makes decisions on where Federal money is going to be spent and since that's an issue that always exists this is a good example of a standing committee a good example of a standing committee in the house is the Ways and Means Committee which is among the most powerful and prestigious committees there and this is the group that's responsible for taxation bills of various kinds the next kind of committee you need to know is the joint committee and these are groups that involve members from both the house and the Senate like they are together jointly we have the joint committee on the library which deals with issues relating to the Library of Congress you also have the joint committee on printing which deals with the publishing arm of the federal government both of these committees are examples of joint committees that persist over time but sometimes joint committees can be formed in the short term as well the next kind of committee you need to know is the select committee this is the opposite of a standing committee which is to say it's a temporary committee that is formed for a very specific purpose if you took AP US History you may remember the Missouri Compromise which established where slavery could exist in the United States well that compromise was hammered out by a select committee that only existed for about a week and then was disbanded after the purpose was accomplished and finally you need to know about conference committees I already mentioned that in order for a bill to become a law identical versions of it must be passed by both houses of Congress and if both houses can agree on an identical version than a conference committee is formed to hammer out the differences now it'll be important for you to understand that even though both houses use committees to get work done the different constitutional responsibilities of the house and the Senate affect the policymaking process say in committees all right if you're overwhelmed by all this information well then go and have yourself a proper cry in the corner and let's keep going okay we've talked about leadership structures and committees and so now let's get down to exactly how Congress gets its work done and let's consider each house separately first the house and as I mentioned the last video house rules mandate limited debate among its members because of its sheer size and in many cases that limit is an hour now in terms of which bills make it to the floor for debate we have to talk about the house rules committee which is a very powerful committee it's essentially the gatekeeper for all legislation and if the rules committee doesn't let a bill through for debate it essentially dies additionally this committee decides when votes take place and assigns bills to various committees for debate and revision and the house also makes use of What's called the committee of the whole which is just a procedural move that relaxes some of the rules for debate so that amendments for bills can be debated quicker it doesn't require all 435 members to be present just a minimum Quorum of 100 Representatives the house also uses what's called a discharge petition in order to get their work done if a Bill gets stuck in committee which can happen more often than you think because bills often go to committees to Die the house can muster a majority vote which brings that bill out of the committee and to the floor for a vote okay now let's look at how the Senate gets its work done because of its smaller size the rules for debate are a lot more relaxed in fact Senators enjoy the privilege of unlimited debate time and so that presents the occasion for the filibuster this is an attempt to stall or kill a bill by talking for a very long time and the award for longest filibuster goes to STM Thurman who talked for 24 hours in 18 minutes to try to kill a Civil Rights bill in 1957 apparently his AIDS set up a bucket in a closet right off the senate floor so that he could you know uh make water and still keep one foot on the senate floor and thus not be disqualified for filibustering so you know that's fun anyway that kind of talkie-talkie filibuster rarely happens anymore today all someone has to do is threaten a filibuster and it basically accomplishes the same thing now there is something called the clure rule by which the Senate can get a filibustering senator to shut their mouth hole and bring the bill to a vote but that requires three-fifths of the Senate to agree and that is not easy to do so that's why all it takes is the threat of a filibuster to stall a bill the Senate also employs the principle of unanimous consent to get their work done this can be applied to a lot of different situations but it's basically a call for agreement by all Senators to restrict certain privileges for the sake of getting work done faster so if everyone agrees that there will be no filibustering for example then the Senate can proceed without fear of getting bogged down okay now that's good enough for our purposes now let's talk about the basic process of of how a bill becomes a law a bill can be sponsored by a member from either the house or the Senate and as that bill is considered and debated it often changes sometimes non-gain writers are added which are Provisions to the bill that actually have nothing to do with the subject of the bill usually these writers benefit a certain representative's District or state another way a bill can change is by the addition of pork barrel spending which are funds earmarked for a particular representative's District either way the point is bills change as they move through the legislative process and once the bill is assigned to a committee it can be further debated and changed but once it comes out it goes to the floor for a vote and the voting process can sometimes be affected by log rolling which is basically when one representative says to another hey I'll vote for your bill if you vote for mine it's really just an elaborate system of congressional backs scratching now probably among the most complex legislation the Congress has to consider is the passing of the federal budget and there are two kinds of spending they have to consider first is mandatory spending which is the money that they have to allocate by law for example Medicare and Medicaid are Healthcare programs which by law have to be paid for thus they are examples of mandatory spending but after all of this is accounted for everything left over is discretionary spending and as you can probably imagine committees debate hard over how to allocate These funds although the biggest category for discretionary spending is always human resources which is to say paying the federal employees who run the government it wouldn't it be hilarious have Congress only allocated as much discretionary spending as they had money in their vaults no man we always spend more than we have and that is called deficit spending as mandatory spending increases it makes sense that discretionary spending should decrease but that is usually not the case so where does Congress get all that extra scratch well they either borrow it or they raise taxes okay that was a beefy video and if you're still here you can click right here to grab a review packet which will help you get an A in your class and a five on your exam in May if you want me to 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