Structure of Congress - AP Government and Politics

The Vice President, despite not being a senator, serves as the President of the Senate. In their absence, the president pro-tempore takes over to run the Senate.

The Speaker of the House serves as the leader of the House of Representatives. Whichever member of Congress that serves as the Speaker runs the congressional meetings and votes that take place.

A joint committee is the only type of committee that includes members of both houses of Congress.

The current Speaker of House, first elected when Republicans came to control the House in the election of 2010, is John Boehner. He was narrowly reelected at the beginning of 2013 and is currently serving his second term as Speaker of the House. As leader of the House, majority party Boehner is expected by tradition, but not required, to abstain from House debates.

A Standing Committee is a long-term, or permanent, Congressional committee that is responsible for one specific area of government policy. Examples include Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs; Energy, and Commerce: Ways and Means, etc.

When there is disagreement between the House and the Senate over the exact language or direction that a bill should be taking, a Conference Committee of members of both houses is formed to try to negotiate these differences.

Only the Senate can try impeached government officials. The rest of the choices apply to the House of Representatives. The House initiates impeachment procedures and all revenue bills. The Senate has one hundred members with six-year terms.

Each state elects two senators as per the constitution, thus senators from states. The number is the current make-up of the House of Representatives where the number of seats is determined by population.

Bicameral means two chambers or two houses, in the case of the United States that is the Senate and the House of Representatives. Unicameral means one chamber or house.

This is a relatively straightforward question. In order to answer, however, you must have understood the distinction between popular/direct election and indirect election. Recall that a directly-elected office means that we the people vote for a person, and then based off of those votes alone, that person is elected (or not). Indirect election, however, means that we the people vote for a person, and then that person votes FOR us to elect the candidate. Do you understand the distinction?

Prior to the ratification of the 17th Amendment, the only popularly elected federal office in the US was the House. In other words, voting members of the public directly cast their ballots for Mr. X or Ms. Y, and whoever gained the majority vote in their district, won.

Senators were NOT directly elected. The founders viewed the passions of the general public to be somewhat too inflammatory (or at least too easily inflamed) to warrant them picking any more than 1 chamber (the House). Senators were elected via state legislatures. In other words, the General Court of Massachusetts (that’s what they call their state legislature) would elect the two senators to represent Massachusetts.

The President was not and is not directly elected. This might be slightly tricky, but remember that WE don’t elect the President: the Electoral College does.

Hence, the correct answer is “the House only.”

Relatively simple answer here. You must be at least 25 years old, and a citizen for at least 7 years prior to taking office as a Member of the House of Representatives. This reflects the Framer’s belief that the House (the “lower” chamber) was to be the less mature and less deliberative of the two chambers; hence the lower age requirements and the lower citizenship requirements. Note also, that you can be an immigrant and be in the House—so long as you’ve been naturalized, and a citizen for 7 years, you are qualified.

You must be 30 years old and a citizen for at least 9 years prior to taking office as a Senator. Contrary to the House, this represents the Framer’s belief that the Senate (the “upper” chamber) was to be the more mature and deliberative of the two chambers; hence the higher age and citizenship requirements. Similar to the House, you can be an immigrant Senator (just with longer naturalization/citizenship requirements). Interestingly, we see the “more mature” element come to play in a few other places, too: confirmation of Article III judges and treaty ratifications.

This is a somewhat tricky question. The US Senate is not capped at anything, although the number of Senators (100) has not changed since 1959 (when Hawaii entered the Union). The House, on the other hand, has been capped at 435 members since 1911, when Congress resolved that any further growth would impede daily activity (in other words, do more harm than good).
That said, it is incredibly important to remember that 435 is the total number cap for the House; the number of House seats per state may fluctuate with the ebbs and flows of population tracked via the decennial census. In other, slightly clearer, words, the total number of House seats is 435, and has been for well over 100 years at this point. Individual states, however, are not capped at any particular number; the number of delegates per state is tied to the population of that state relative to every other state.

This is a relatively straightforward question, although it’s difficult to wrap your mind around. The short answer is yes, there is a possibility that a majority of the Senate (that is 51 members (or more)) can be controlled by a minority of the population. This is a product of the “flat-rate” apportionment, for lack of a better word.

This, clearly, calls for more explanation. So, first, hopefully you remember that each state is entitled to 2 Senators, regardless of the size of the State’s population. Thus, CA and AK both have 2 Senators, even though their respective populations are polar opposites in size. Second, remember that Senators are not beholden to “districts” in the sense that they run state-wide.

Now, imagine that the population of every “small” and “medium” state is split nearly 50-50 Republican-Democrat. Imagine further that there are barely (just barely) more Democrats in each of these states. On Election Day, however, 100% of the Republicans turn out and vote (for Republicans) and only, say, 60% of the Democrats turn out and vote (for Democrats). All of our “small” and “medium” states have now elected Republicans as their Senators, and we’ll go ahead and say that they make up 26 States (so 52 Senators).

Assume that every “large” state is 100% Democrat, and that everyone shows up, votes for, and elects Democrats on Election Day. Thus those 24 states elect 48 Democrat Senators.

But look what happened! Even though a larger percentage of the population is Democrat (in our example), the Republicans achieved a majority in the Senate! There are many variations of this, but this is the most extreme way in which a minority party can control a majority of the Senate.

The correct answer is , or (that’s actually the more correct answer). The Senate is structured so that there is never more than of its members up for reelection at one time. Don’t confuse this with the number of years in a Senator’s term. A Senator has a term of 6 years—every Senator has a term of 6 years, but the entire Senate (that is, every Senator) is not up for reelection every 6 years: Senators have staggered terms. Thus, one Senator’s 6-year term may expire, say, in 2016; another’s 6-year term in 2018, and so forth.

Senators and House members do not have term limits. In fact, the only elected official with a term limit (on the federal level) is the President. Presidents are limited to 2 elected terms (8 years) or two elected terms and no more than ½ of an unelected term, for a total of 10 years. Members of Congress, however, are limited only by the number of terms to which they are (1) alive and (2) electable. Strom Thurmond, for example, served as a Senator for 48 years—he was elected 8 times! That said, he was also over 100 when he died.

This should be an easy question all around. The answer is 2. Remember: the founders meant for the House to be tied (closely) to the people—hence the short terms. The quick turnover in the House is a compromise between allowing the voting citizenry to express their frustration while it’s still relatively fresh and giving members enough time to actually get something done prior to (maybe) getting voted out of office. In addition to close ties to the people, the Founders created shortened terms as an expression of their belief that the House was the less “mature” of the two chambers.

This question turns on your understanding of the Framers’ mindset when writing the Constitution—and their previous experiences. After being under Britain’s thumb and revolting over (among many other things) a variety of taxes, the Framers wanted to make sure that the power to tax and spend would be relegated to the Chamber closest to people—the House. To that end, all appropriations bills (basically when the government wants to “spend” money) MUST originate in the House.

The Senate, on the other hand, was supposed to be the chamber of cooler passions and more deliberation. To that end, the Senate is given the exclusive power to ratify treaties.

A pocket veto is often confusing to students. That said, it’s a relatively simple process, once you learn the timing. A pocket veto is when the President receives a bill from Congress (that is, it has been passed by both chambers) and then: (1) the President chooses NOT to act on the bill for 10 days and (2) Congress adjourns within the same 10-day period. If, on the other hand, the President simply chooses not to act for 10 days, and Congress is still in session, the bill becomes law WITHOUT his signature—a so-called “pocket pass.”

Pocket vetoes are relatively infrequent for a variety of reasons. First, the meaning of “adjourns” is ambiguous, so nobody is precisely sure how long Congress has to be out. Second, a pocket veto is “absolute” in the sense that it cannot be overridden—the bill must be reintroduced, and then voted upon in both chambers, and then presented to the President (again). Third, in light of the first two, Congress has come up with a variety of clever tactics to essentially strip the pocket veto of its effectiveness (all of which are beyond the scope of your course).

This is a relatively easy question, provided that you know (or remember) what candidate- and party-centered politics are. Sometimes the most obvious answer is the correct answer, and that is indeed the case here: candidate-centered politics emphasize the role of the individual politician—in other words, the candidate seeks to run on the message of, ‘what can I do for you?’ Party-centered politics, however, emphasize the role of a particular politician’s party more so than his individuality—that is, the candidate seeks to run on the message of, ‘what can my party do for you?’

The other two answers involving the constitution are wrong for the simple reasons that political parties are not even mentioned in the Constitution (thus, it would be impossible for a party-centered politics to be anywhere in the Constitution).