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Act – A bill passed by the Senate and the House, and signed by the President or passed over his veto.
Ad Hoc Select Committee – A temporary committee formed for a special purpose or to deal with a specific subject.
Adjournment – The end of a legislative day. Regular adjournments set the date for the next meeting. Adjournment sine die (without a day) marks the end of the session, since it does not set a time for reconvening.
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Balanced Budget – In governmental accounting terms, a budget in which anticipated or actual total revenues equal anticipated or actual total expenditures. Conversely, an unbalanced budget is one in which expenditures exceed revenues, or vice versa.
Balanced Budget Amendment – A proposal for a constitutional amendment mandating that federal expenditures not exceed federal revenues in any fiscal year.
Baseline – A projection of the levels of federal spending, revenues, and the resulting budgetary surpluses or deficits for the upcoming and subsequent fiscal years, taking into account laws enacted to date and assuming no new policy decisions. It provides a benchmark for measuring the budgetary effects of proposed changes in federal revenues or spending, assuming certain economic conditions. Baseline projections are prepared by the Congressional Budget Office.
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Calendar – List of bills awaiting action, entered in order reported.
Cap – The legal limit on new spending and budget authority in a discretionary appropriations category of the budget during a particular fiscal year.
Capped Entitlement – An entitlement on which an overall annual funding limit is placed and funding is distributed by formula.
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Debate – Formal discussion presenting both supporting and opposing views on a matter before the legislative body.
Debt Ceiling – A statutory limit imposed on the total outstanding federal debt. The ceiling can be raised or lowered through an act of Congress.
Deficiency Appropriation – An appropriation to cover the difference between an agency’s regular appropriation and the amount deemed necessary for it to operate for the full fiscal year. In recent years, deficiency bills have usually been called supplemental appropriations.
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Earmark – To set aside funds for a specific purpose, use, or recipient.
Effective Dates – Provisions of an act that specify when the entire act or individual provisions in it become effective as law.
Electronic Voting – Since 1973, the House has used an electronic voting system to record the yeas and nays and to conduct recorded votes. Members vote by inserting their voting cards in one of the boxes at several locations in the chamber. They are given at least fifteen minutes to vote. The House also uses the electronic system for quorum calls. The Senate does not have electronic voting.
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Father of the House – Unofficial title of the representative with the longest continuous service in the House. This member has no official functions, but, by custom, administers the oath of office to the Speaker at the beginning of each Congress.
Federal Debt – The total amount of monies borrowed and not yet repaid by the federal government. Federal debt consists of public debt and agency debt.
Field Hearing – A committee or subcommittee hearing held outside of Washington, DC often in the district or state of a committee member.
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Gag Rule – A pejorative term for any type of special rule reported by the House Rules Committee that proposes to prohibit amendments to a measure or only permits amendments offered by the reporting committee.
Galleries – The balconies overlooking each chamber. From different seating areas in the galleries, the public, news media, staff, and others may observe and listen to the floor proceedings.
General Accounting Office – A congressional support agency often referred to as the investigative arm of Congress. It evaluates and audits federal agencies and programs in the U.S. and abroad on its own initiative or at the request of congressional committees, their chairmen and ranking minority members, or, occasionally, other members.
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Hearings – Committee or subcommittee meetings to receive testimony on proposed legislation during investigations or for oversight purposes. Relatively few bills are important enough to justify formal hearings. Witnesses often include experts, government officials, spokespersons for interested groups, officials of the General Accounting Office, and members of Congress.
Hold-Harmless Clause – In legislation providing a new formula for allocating federal funds, a clause to ensure that recipients of those funds do not receive less in a future year than they did in the current year if the new formula would result in a reduction for them.
House – Always capitalized when referring to the House of Representatives, but usually not when referring either to the House or the Senate, as in “each house” or “the two houses of Congress.”
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Impeachment – The first step to remove the President, Vice President, or other federal civil officers from office and to disqualify them from any further federal office of “honor, trust or profit.” The House has the sole power of impeachment while the Senate has the sole power of trying the charges and convicting. The House impeaches by a simple majority vote; conviction requires a two-thirds vote of all senators present.
Inspector General – A position created in 1992 to audit the administrative functions of the House of Representatives. Appointed jointly by the Speaker, majority leader and minority leader, the inspector general reports to them, to the director of non-legislative and financial services, and to the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on House Administration.
Introduction – The presentation of a bill.
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Joint Committee – A committee made up of members of both the House and the Senate. The functions of most joint committees involve investigation, research, or oversight of agencies closely related to Congress.
Joint Referral – Another term for a multiple referral: the referral of a measure to two or more committees simultaneously.
Joint Resolution – A joint resolution, designated H J Res or S J Res, requires the approval of both chambers and the signature of the President, just as a bill does, and has the force of law if approved. There is no real difference between a bill and a joint resolution. The latter is generally used in dealing with limited matters, such as a single appropriation for a specific purpose or the correction of errors in existing law.
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Killer Amendment – An amendment that, if agreed to, might lead to the defeat of the measure it amends, either in the house in which the amendment is offered or at some later stage of the legislative process.
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Lame Duck – Jargon for a member who has not been reelected, or did not seek reelection, and is serving the balance of his or her term.
Law – An Act of Congress that has been signed by the President, or passed over his veto by the Congress. Laws are listed numerically by Congress. For example, the Carl D. Perkins Vocational Education and Applied Technology Act of 1984 as amended in 1990 is Public Law 98-524, meaning it was the 524th law passed by the 98th Congress.
Leadership – Usually, a reference to the majority and minority leaders of the Senate or to the Speaker and minority leader of the House.
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Main Question – A measure, motion, or proposal under consideration, as distinguished from the amendments to it.
Major Committees – The rules of the House Democratic Caucus apply this designation to certain committees and state that no Democratic representative may serve on more than one of them. As of 1993, the major committees were Agriculture; Armed Services; Banking, Finance, and Urban Affairs; Education and Labor; Foreign Affairs; Energy and Commerce; Judiciary; and Public Works and Transportation.
Majority Leader – The majority party’s chief floor spokesman, elected by that party’s caucus – sometimes called the floor leader. In the Senate, the majority leader also develops the party’s political and procedural strategy, usually in conjunction with other party officials and committee chairmen. He negotiates the Senate’s agenda and committee ratios with the minority leader and usually calls up measures for floor action. In the House, the majority leader is the Speaker’s deputy and heir apparent. He helps plan the floor agenda and the party’s legislative strategy and often speaks for the party leadership in debate.
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Nomination – A proposed presidential appointment to a federal office submitted to the Senate for confirmation. Approval is by majority vote. The Constitution explicitly requires confirmation for ambassadors, consuls, “public Ministers” (department heads), and Supreme Court justices. By law, other federal judges, all military promotions of officers, and many high-level civilian officials must be confirmed. In any year, the Senate processes almost 40,000 nominations, most of them for military positions and the vast bulk with little debate or objection.
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Oath of Office – Upon taking office, members of Congress must swear or affirm that they will “support and defend the Constitution…against all enemies, foreign and domestic,” that they will “bear true faith and allegiance” to the Constitution, that they take the obligation “freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion,” and that they will “well and faithfully discharge the duties” of their office. The oath is required by the Constitution; the wording is prescribed by a statue.
Obligated Balance – The amount of an appropriation that has been obligated but not spent. Usually this balance is carried forward to succeeding fiscal years until the obligations are paid.
Obligation – A binding agreement by a government agency to pay for goods, products, services, studies, and the like, either immediately or in the future. When an agency enters into such an agreement, it incurs an obligation. As the agency makes the required payments, it liquidates the obligation.
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Pairing – A procedure that permits two or three members to enter into voluntary arrangements that offset their votes so that one or more of the members can be absent without changing the result. The names of paired members and their positions on the vote (except on general pairs) appear in the Congressional Record (italics). Members can be paired on one vote or on a series of votes.
Parliamentarian – The official advisor to the presiding officer in each house on questions of procedure. The parliamentarian and his/ her assistants also answer procedural questions from members and congressional staff, refer measures to committees on behalf of the presiding officer, and maintain compilations of the precedents. Either a parliamentarian or an assistant is always present and near the podium during sessions of each house. The Speaker appoints the House parliamentarian. Nominally, the Secretary of the Senate appoints its parliamentarian, but always with the approval of the majority leader.
Parliamentary Law – The formal rules governing the methods of procedure, discussion, and debate in deliberative bodies and organized assemblies.
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Quorum – The number of members who must be present to conduct business. In the House, it is 218, and, in the Senate, it is 51.
Quorum Call – A procedure for determining whether a quorum is present in a chamber. In the Senate, the clerk calls the roll (roster) of senators. The House usually employs its electronic voting system.
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Rank or Ranking – A member’s position on the list of his party’s members on a committee or subcommittee. When first assigned to a committee, a member is placed at the bottom of the list, then moves up as those above leave the committee. On subcommittees, however, a member’s rank may not have anything to do with the length of his/her service on it.
Ranking Member – Member of a committee who has more seniority on the committee than any other member of his/her party. Usually refers to the most senior minority party member.
Ranking Minority Member – The member whose name appears at the head of the list of minority members on a committee or subcommittee. The ranking minority member usually appoints the minority staff, acts as minority floor manager on committee measures, and recommends minority members for appointment as conferees on such measures.
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Second Reading – The stage in bill passage where amendments on the floor are taken up.
Secret or Closed Session – A session of either house that is held behind closed doors to discuss business deemed to require secrecy. Only members and necessary staff may attend.
Secretary of the Senate – The chief administrative and budgetary officer of the Senate. The secretary manages a wide range of functions that support the operation of the Senate as an organization as well as those functions necessary to its legislative process.
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Table – The decision of a standing committee to put off considering a measure.
Task Force – A title sometimes given to a panel of members assigned to a special project, study, or investigation. The House Budget Committee uses task forces in place of subcommittees. Ordinarily, these groups do not have authority to report measures to their respective houses.
Third Reading – Final passage stage for a bill.
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Unanimous Consent – Usual way of conducting business in the Senate. After the morning hour, the majority leader asks unanimous consent to consider pending legislation. Such requests are rarely objected to. The term is also used in both chambers in lieu of a vote on non-controversial measures.
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Veto – Action that can be taken by the President. If the President does not approve of a bill or joint resolution, the President returns it with objections to the chamber of origin, where the bill may be reconsidered. It must receive approval of two-thirds of both chambers to become law. When Congress has adjourned, the President may pocket veto a bill by refusing to sign it.
Vote – A recorded vote is one in which each member’s stand is individually known. In the Senate, this is done by a roll call vote of the entire membership. The House uses an electronic voting system for voting. In either the House or the Senate, members can conduct a voice vote by answering either “aye” or “no” in chorus. The presiding officer then decides the vote.
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