Whether institutional position or legislators’ interests drive legislative behavior is a central question in the congressional literature. This article focuses on the committee system in the House of Representatives and leverages the distinction between committee requests and assignments to shed new light on this debate. There is strong evidence that institutional position is largely responsible for increased legislative activity in relevant policy areas. However, there are limits to the institutional advantages of membership and its influence. The benefits of membership do not accrue to legislators immediately, and during their first term, legislators’ expressed interest increases their activity. By their second term, the power of the institution balances out these differences of interest. Legislators’ interests also play an important role in more costly behavior, like passing legislation. Legislators adapt to their institutional position, but they also remain true to the issues they believed deserved their attention when they first entered Congress.
AdlerE. S. (2000). Constituency characteristics and the “guardian” model of appropriations subcommittees, 1959-1998. American Journal of Political Science, 44, 104-114.
2.
AdlerE. S. (2002). Why congressional reforms fail: Reelection and the house committee system. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
3.
AdlerE. S.LapinskiD. (1997). Demand-side theory and congressional committee composition: A constituency characteristics approach. American Journal of Political Science, 41, 895-918.
AinsworthS.AkinsF. (1997). The informational role of caucuses in the U.S. congress. American Politics Quarterly, 25, 407-430.
6.
BurdenB. (2007). Personal roots of representation. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
7.
CarsonJ.FinocchiaroC.RohdeD. (2002). Partisanship, consensus, and committee-floor divergence: A comparison of member behavior in the 96th and 104th congresses. American Politics Research, 30, 3-33.
8.
CoxG.McCubbinsM. (2007). Legislative leviathan. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
9.
CrespinM. (2010). Serving two masters: Redistricting and voting in the U.S. house of representatives. Political Research Quarterly, 63, 850-859.
10.
DavidsonR.OleszekW.LeeF.SchicklerE. (2013). Congress and its members (13th ed.). Washington, DC: CQ Press.
11.
DeeringC. J.SmithS. S. (1997). Committees in congress. Washington, DC: CQ Press.
12.
FennoR. (1973). Congressmen in committees. Boston, MA: Little, Brown.
13.
FrischS.KellyS. (2004). Self-selection reconsidered. Political Research Quarterly, 57, 325-336.
14.
FrischS.KellyS. (2006). Committee assignment politics in the U.S. house of representatives. Oklahoma City: University of Oklahoma Press.
15.
GambleK. (2007). Black political representation: An examination of legislative activity within U.S. house committees. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 32, 421-447.
16.
GilliganT.KrehbielK. (1987). Collective decision-making and standing committees: An informational rationale for restrictive amendment procedures. The Journal of Law, Economics, & Organization, 3, 287-335.
17.
GilliganT.KrehbielK. (1989). Asymmetric information and legislative rules with a heterogeneous committee. American Journal of Political Science, 33, 459-490.
18.
GrimmerJ.PowellE. N. (2013). Congressmen in exile: The politics and consequences of involuntary committee removal. Journal of Politics, 75, 907-920.
19.
GrosecloseT. (1994a). Testing committee composition hypotheses for the U.S. congress. Journal of Politics, 56, 440-458.
20.
GrosecloseT. (1994b). The committee outlier debate: A review and a reexamination of some of the evidence. Public Choice, 80, 265-273.
21.
HallR. L. (1987). Participation and purpose in committee decision making. American Political Science Review, 81, 105-128.
22.
HallR. L. (1996). Participation in congress. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
23.
HallR. L.GrofmanB. (1990). The committee assignment process and the conditional nature of committee bias. American Political Science Review, 84, 1149-1166.
24.
HallR. L.WaymanF. W. (1990). Buying time: Moneyed interests and the mobilization of bias in congressional committees. American Political Science Review, 84, 787-820.
25.
HanmerM.KalkanK. O. (2013). Behind the curve: Clarifying the best approach to calculating predicted probabilities and marginal effects from limited dependent variable models. American Journal of Political Science, 57, 263-277.
26.
KellermanM.ShepsleK. (2009). Congressional careers, committee assignments, and seniority randomization in the U.S. house of representatives. Quarterly Journal of Political Science, 4, 87-101.
27.
KrehbielK. (1990). Are congressional committees composed of preference outliers?American Political Science Review, 84, 149-163.
28.
KrehbielK. (1991). Information and legislative organization. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
29.
KrutzG. (2005). Issues and institutions: “Winnowing” in the U.S. congress. American Journal of Political Science, 49, 313-326.
30.
LawrenceE.MaltzmanF.WahlbeckP. (2001). Dispensing Opportunity and Power: The Politics of Committee Assignments in the Cannon Houses. American Journal of Political Science, 45, 551-562.
31.
LeeF. (2003). Geographic politics in the U.S. house of representatives: Coalition building and distribution of benefits. American Journal of Political Science, 47, 713-727.
MayhewD. (1974). Congress: The electoral connection. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
35.
MilerK. C. (2016). Legislative responsiveness to constituency change. American Politics Research, 44, 794-815.
36.
PerkinsL. (1980). Influences of members’ goals on their committee behavior: The U.S. House Judiciary Committee. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 5, 373-392.
37.
RoccaM.GordonS. (2010). The position-taking value of bill sponsorship in congress. Political Research Quarterly, 63, 387-397.
38.
RohdeD. (1994). Parties and committees in the house: Member motivations, issues, and institutional arrangements. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 19, 341-359.
39.
RohdeD.ShepsleK. (1973). Democratic committee assignments in the house of representatives. American Political Science Review, 67, 889-905.
40.
SchillerW. (1995). Senators as political entrepreneurs: Using bill sponsorship to shape the legislative agenda. American Journal of Political Science, 39, 186-203.
41.
ShepsleK. (1978). The giant jigsaw puzzle: Democratic committee assignments in the modern house. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
42.
ShepsleK.WeingastB. (1987). The institutional foundations of committee power. American Political Science Review, 81, 85-104.
43.
SinclairB. (2011). Unorthodox lawmaking: New legislative processes in the US congress. Washington, DC: CQ Press.
44.
SmithS. S.DeeringC. J. (1983). Changing motives for committee preferences of new members of the U.S. house. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 8, 271-281.
45.
SpragueM. (2008). The effects of measurement and methods decisions on committee preference outlier results. Political Research Quarterly, 61, 309-318.
46.
SulkinT. (2005). Issue politics in congress. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
47.
SulkinT. (2011). The legislative legacy of congressional campaigns. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
48.
UslanerE. (1974). Congressional committee assignments: Alternate models for behavior. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.
49.
VoldenC.WisemanA. (2014). Legislative effectiveness in the United States congress: The lawmakers. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
50.
WawroG. (2000). Legislative entrepreneurship in the U.S. house of representatives. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
51.
WoonJ. (2008). Bill sponsorship in congress: The moderating effect of agenda positions on legislative proposals. Journal of Politics, 70, 201-216.
