Questions tagged [us-congress]
United Stated Congress, the legislative body in the United States that is comprised of the House of Representatives (435 members) and the Senate (100 members)
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If Bill Clinton was impeached, why did he finish his second term?
I don't understand how he could have been impeached but did not have to leave office.
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Who presided over the election and swearing in of the first Speaker of the House?
The Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives is elected by the incoming members of the House at the start of each new Congress. House rules stipulate that this election is presided by the Clerk ...
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Why does the US House of Representatives have a ceremonial mace, but the Senate does not?
The US House of Representatives has its own ceremonial mace, which was apparently one of the first things that they authorized once they met for the first time. However, the Senate does not seem to ...
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Is it true that slavery was banned from discussion on the Senate and/or House floor before the American Civil War?
In one of the latter years of my undergraduate program I read/heard from one of my classes that discussing the slave trade/slavery on either the Senate and/or House floor (I forget which) was banned. ...
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Is the USA Congress explicitly patterned after the British Parliament?
I have always presumed this to be the case. They have a similar form: two chambers, the lower representing "all the people" and the upper representing, very roughly speaking, "institutional forces" (...
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Why was Kentucky not admitted to the Union in 1789?
At the beginning of July 1788, the unicameral Congress of the Confederation began deliberations on whether to admit the proposed new state of Kentucky to the Union. Under the Articles of Confederation,...
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How Many Members of US Congress Have Died While In Office?
As best I can tell, Leo Ryan of California is the only U.S. Member of Congress murdered while in office. He was killed by members of the People's Temple in Guyana in 1978. What I'm looking for are how ...
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When was the last US letter of marque issued?
Article I of the United States Constitution lists "grant[ing] Letters of Marque and Reprisal" as an explicit power of the Congress. Are these still being issued? If not, when was the last ...
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What was the congressional level of support for Emancipation Proclamation?
Wikipedia covers pretty extensively the political details surrounding the 13th Amendment, including difficulties in passing it in the House.
However, it doesn't note what the level of Congressional ...
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Was the house of representatives really as rowdy a place as it is portrayed in the 2012 film Lincoln?
In the 2012 film Lincoln the House of Representatives is portrayed as being a rather rowdy and disorderly place. There are frequent interruptions of the person holding the floor, lots of booing and ...
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Why did the the US House of Representatives stop reading George Washington's farewell address on his birthday?
In January 1862, during the American Civil War, thousands of Philadelphia residents signed a petition requesting the Congress to commemorate the 130th anniversary of Washington's birth by reading his ...
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How successful (or not) was the Civil Rights Act of 1964 concerning employment discrimination?
In 1964 Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, which greatly increased the federal government’s power concerning personal property. Using the Commerce Clause and the recent SCOTUS decision in Wickard v....
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Organizing the 1788 presidential and congressional elections
In 1788 the new Constitution of the United States went into effect in the states that had ratified it, and that meant elections had to be organized for representatives in Congress and for members of ...
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Did the Southern States make any attempt to secede from the Union through an act of Congress?
I have read the answers about the legality of southern secession - very helpful; thank you. In light of those, I have another question: Did the Southern States make any attempt to secede from the ...
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President proposes bills: provenance
The President of the United States sends proposed bills to members of Congress, that they may introduce the bills on his behalf. There's no provision for this in the Constitution (AFAICT).
What was ...
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Has the US Congress's power to declare war been rendered superfluous by recent conflicts?
After the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, the Congress of the United States formally declared war on Japan. After Germany declared war on the United States, the Congress then formally declared war on ...
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How do vetoes affect re-votes in US Congress?
I would think that a president challenging the will of congress would cause congress to vote differently out of principle but am curious if this is true.
Throughout history, what is the percentage ...
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Is there mutual significance in the year 1807, so far as abolition of the slave trade in Britain and the United States is concerned?
I have just read an article in the autumn edition of The Historian (British publication of the Historical Association) by Professor John Coffey of the University of Leicester on The secret diaries of ...
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Why was the "first Monday in December" originally chosen as the default meeting date for Congress?
The original Constitution of the United States did not explicitly specify many dates, but one was the default date for which Congress was required to meet:
The Congress shall assemble at least once ...
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What was Wilson's mistake in the 1918 Congressional election?
Keynes writes in The Economic Consequences of the Peace that
The President's mistaken policy over the Congressional election had
weakened his personal position in his own country, and it was by ...
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Has the US Congress ever repealed a law?
Has the United States Congress ever repealed legislation, rather than amend the legislation or let the legislation be annulled by the Supreme Court?
It seems to me that once a law is passed it ...
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US Congress in WW2 Compared with other legislative bodies
As a British A Level Modern History student, I know that the British Parliament came together in a National Government, or a coalition of all parties during World War 2 and with the exception of a few ...
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What does 'trade in' mean in this article on the Westway project?
A little background so you know where we are at. I'm doing a paper concerning the Westway project* specifically the period immediately before the collapse of the project in which hundreds of ...
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Largest congressional letter writing campaign in US history?
In the United States, there is a system where folks can write letters to their representative and senators in congress to bring attention to a particular issue, sometimes as a timely event or a hot-...
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What was the Soviet reaction to the revelations about secret US programs like Projects ARTICHOKE, MKULTRA, MOCKINGBIRD, etc., revealed in the 1970s?
I imagine the perception among the party elites in Moscow would have been that all these programs, projects, experiments and so on were initiated with them in mind, and would have inevitably been ...
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Has the US Congress ever met outdoors?
Has either house of the United States Congress ever met to do official business outdoors?
I tried searching for "Has Congress ever met outdoors?", "Has the House of Representatives ever ...
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What is the source of the Senate-as-saucer story?
A famous (though perhaps fictional) simile often quoted to point out
the differences between the House and Senate involves an argument
between George Washington, who favored having two chambers of ...
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Why was Schuyler Colfax not present at the vote to reconsider the 13th amendment?
According to this question about the thirteenth amendment and by extension this source it references, both say that Schuyler Colfax, the speaker at the time did not vote on the motion to reconsider ...
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Which 4 states were not present to ratify the treaty of Paris on January 14th, 1784?
Which 4 states were not present to ratify the treaty of Paris on January 14th, 1784
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Why was the Congressional Apportionment Amendment opposed?
The Congressional Apportionment Amendment only established a principal for congressional apportionment, which was followed out of custom for many years after the adoption of the constitution. If these ...
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How did Mississippi regain representation without ratifying the 13th amendment?
I read that Congress required former Confederate states to ratify the 13th amendment in order to regain representation in the federal government, but Mississippi didn't ratify it until 1995 and not ...
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Most significant Congressional Leaders in US History? [closed]
In all of US history, which Congressional marjority/minority leaders and speakers are considered historically important? For example, FDR and Lincoln are, for better or worse, considered historically ...
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