Profile of a Member of Congress
GOVT 2305, Professor Tannahill
Text Reference
:
Gateways to Democracy
, Chapter 12
Each student has been assigned a different member of the U.S. House. To find the name
of the member assigned to you, click on the student assignment file posted below.
We can learn a great deal about the operation of Congress and its role in the
policymaking process by focusing on individual members of the body. You can learn
about the member of Congress assigned to you from a number of library resources as
well as on the Internet. The best library resources are the most recent editions of
Almanac
of American Politics
and
Politics in America
. They are excellent reference books with
information about current members of Congress.
The Internet will provide you with a great deal of useful material. The information at
www.house.gov
will be particularly helpful because it will direct you to the website
for the member of Congress that you are researching. That site will include biographical
data and information about committee assignments. It will probably also tell you
something about the member’s pet issues and viewpoints. Keep in mind that the member’s
office provides the content of his or her website, so don’t expect anything critical or
negative to appear. (If you rely solely on a member’s website for information, you may
be subsequently embarrassed to discover that the member has been involved in a serious
or at least interesting scandal that was not reported on the website.) The House website
will also have links to the homepages for each House committee, which will describe the
policy issues each committee addresses.
The website for Project Vote Smart will be useful as well. It is located
at
htpps.vote-smart.org/
. The search box at the top of the page allows users to
search for a member of Congress by name. The site
includes information about
campaign finances, issue positions, voting records, public statements,
and interest group assessments. The interest group websites include
issue scorecards in which the groups evaluate members of Congress
based on their voting records. Keep in mind that the scorecards reveal
how interest groups feel about the member of Congress, not vice
versa. Groups concerned with abortion are at the top, but you can use
the drop down menu to find other types of groups. Keep in mind that
interest groups are not objective in their evaluations. If you aren’t
sure about a particular group’s bias, you can go to its website for
more information or research it online.
The
website
of
the
Federal
Election
Commission
(
https://www.fec.gov/) shows how much money candidates for
Congress have raised. Candidates are required by law to report
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fundraising data to the FCC. If a candidate doesn’t report any money
raised, it’s because the candidate has not raised any money.
The Center for Responsive Politics has an excellent website providing
information about members of Congress. It is located at
www.opensecrets.org
. You can use it to find detailed information about the
campaign finances and election results for the representative you are
researching. Click on “Congressional Elections” under the “Politicians
and Elections” tab to find information about fundraising in the 2018
election campaigns. The website also has biographical information on
members of Congress.
CNN,
New York Times
, and other news outlets will have the results of
the 2018 election available online. You can visit the
New York Times
site at the following address:
http://elections.nytimes.com/2018/results/house
You will also want to use an Internet search engine to look for recent
stories involving the member of Congress you are researching. Go to
www.google.com and type in the name of the member of Congress
assigned to you. It will help you learn about recent events involving
the member, including issues not covered on the member’s own
website.
Other sites with useful information include the following:
www.govtrack.us
www.congress.org
http://thomas.loc.gov/
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/findyourreps.xpd
The Top Chart of Corrupt Cities in America
Good Advice
:
Do not wait until the day the assignment is due to begin work. That is a
prescription for a very poor grade.
Read the questions closely before answering them. Students frequently lose
points for failing to fully answer. In particular, if the question asks you to write a
paragraph, that means you need to write several sentences. A paragraph is not a
single sentence. As you recall from your English class, paragraphs have topic
3
sentences, several sentences in the body that develop the topic sentence, and a
concluding sentence that ties the paragraph together.
My expectation is that your project submission will be three-to-five pages long
depending on whether you include the questions. If your submission is only one
or two pages, be sure that you have completely answered each question. If your
submission is longer than five pages, you will probably lose points for being too
wordy or being repetitious.
Never, never, never copy and paste from a website. The purpose of this
assignment is for you to learn to do research. That involves finding information,
reporting it, and interpreting it. Copying and pasting from a website is the
opposite of research. It is the opposite of critical thinking. It is the opposite of
what any self-respecting college student should do. When I detect that a student
has copied and pasted from a source (and it is always obvious), I immediately go
into overdrive looking for opportunities to take off points. Nothing irritates me
more because it shows me that the student has no interest in learning how to
think critically and write about his or her ideas.
Don’t provide information that has not been requested. Don’t include information
relevant to question 3 when answering question 2. Don’t stray off topic.
Be sure to use correct grammar and punctuation. One of the reasons you are in
college is to learn to write correctly. Here are some common writing errors and
websites that briefly explain correct usage:
o
Differentiating between possessives and plurals:
http://www.meredith.edu/grammar/plural.htm
o
Using apostrophes correctly: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/apostrophe
o
Avoiding run-on sentences:
http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/runons.htm
o
Avoiding sentence fragments:
http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/fragments.htm
o
Using semicolons correctly:
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/semicolon
o
Matching pronouns with their antecedents:
http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/pronouns.htm
o
Using commas correctly:
http://www.grammarbook.com/punctuation/commas.asp
Grading criteria
:
Following directions. Please read the directions for each question carefully and
follow them closely. Be sure to address all parts of each question.
Using correct English grammar. Write in complete sentences, avoiding the sort of
shortcut constructions that people use in text messages. Because you have the
opportunity to submit your project to an English tutor for assistance, I expect
good writing and I will take off points for grammatical errors. I especially watch
for sentence fragments, run-on sentences, confusing plural with possessive,
pronoun-antecedent agreement errors, and misuse of the semi-colon.
Providing accurate and timely information. You should have up-do-date
information on the member of Congress you are researching.
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Thinking clearly. Many of the questions require you to apply course concepts to
real world situations. I will sometimes also ask you to explain the reasoning
process you followed in deriving your answer.
Doing your own work. Write in your own words. If you copy and paste from a
website, I will spot it easily and you will lose points.
You should treat this assignment as a series of numbered short
answer questions. DO NOT write a unified essay. The project
you submit should have the answers numbered one through
ten.
If you fail to follow the instructions above, you will earn a
ZERO!
A good way to complete the exercise is to copy and paste the questions into an RTF or
Word file. (Do not submit a PDF file.) Then, supply answers after the questions, being
careful to address all parts of the question.
Please Note: For best success, carefully read the instructions above before you
begin work on the questions below.
1. Write a paragraph describing the personal, professional, and educational
background of the representative before he or she entered Congress. Focus on
the non-political aspects of the member’s life. In what ways is the
representative you are studying typical of other members of the U.S. House?
In what ways is he or she atypical? (The word
atypical
means not typical.)
Base your judgment on the description of the typical member of Congress
found in
Gateways to Democracy,
pp. 402-405 and the online profile of the
membership of Congress found at the following Internet site:
https://www.everycrsreport.com/reports/R44762.html (10 pts.)
2. Write a paragraph describing the representative’s political background.
Identify the elected and appointed positions in government the person you are
studying held before being elected to Congress. Identify the year the
representative first won election to the U.S. House. Is he or she a career
politician? What is the basis of your judgment? A career politician is someone
who wishes to earn his or her living in the political arena for an extended
period of time. (10 pts.)
3. Write a paragraph describing the district the member represents. Where is it
located in the state? Does it include any towns? Is it part of a major city? Is it
inner-city urban, suburban, small town, or rural? What issue or issues would
you expect to be particularly important to the residents and interest groups
found in the member’s district because of the nature of the district? Identify at
least one issue and explain why it is particularly important in this
congressional district, whereas it might not be as important in other districts.
(10 pts.)
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4. Write a paragraph discussing the representative’s committee assignments. On
which standing congressional committees does the member serve? [Look up
the term “standing committee.”] Is the representative the chair or ranking
minority member of a committee? [Look up “ranking minority member.”]
What sorts of policy issues does each of the standing committees address? Is
the representative a member of any subcommittees? Does he/she chair any
subcommittees or serve as the ranking member? [Please note: Do NOT give
me information about the member’s participation in congressional caucuses.]
(10 pts.)
5. How much money did the representative raise for the 2018 election? How
much did his or her main opponent raise? (If the database indicates that a
challenger raised no money, it means just that—the challenger raised no
money.) The Center for Responsive Politics presents data on this issue at the
following Internet address: www.opensecrets.org. Data can also be found at
FEC.gov. What were the most important sources of the representative’s
campaign funds? Identify two or three important sources of funding. Did the
candidate self-fund to any significant degree? (Click on the representative’s
name at the website and it opens up to provide detailed data.) The textbook
discusses congressional elections on pp. 347-356. (10 pts.)
6. What percentage of the vote did the representative receive in the 2018
election? Based on the results of the 2018 election and the data on fundraising,
does it appear that this representative is firmly entrenched in Congress?
[Please note: If you submit your project prior to the election (November
6), you can’t answer this question. Instead, you should discuss whether
you think your representative will win.]
(
Entrenched
means unlikely to be
defeated for reelection anytime soon.) Why or why not? Is this typical for
members of Congress in general? (10 pts.)
7. The Project Vote Smart website includes links to several interest groups that
rate members of Congress based on their voting records. (If you aren’t sure
what an interest group is, you should go back and reread Chapter 8 of the
textbook.) The group identifies a set of votes that it considers important and
gives the member a score depending on whether the member supports the
policy positions favored by the group. [A high score means that the member
voted the way the interest group likes most of the time.] Select one of the
groups (using the pull-down menu) and research its evaluation of the member
of Congress you are studying. What group did you select? (Choose a specific
group rather than a category of groups.) With what sorts of issues is the group
concerned? Be specific. How does the group feel about the member of
Congress you are studying? Would you expect the group to consider him or
her an ally, an enemy, or something in between? Discuss. (10 pts.)
8. The Project Vote Smart website includes a link to speeches and public
statements of each representative. Review some of the recent speeches and
public statements of the representative you are studying. Identify an issue on
which the representative has recently focused. What is the issue? Why does
the representative think it is important? What position has the representative
taken? Do not just copy the statement of the representative. (10 pts.)
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9. To which political party does the member of Congress belong? Based on his
or her voting record, interest group evaluations, fundraising sources, and issue
positions, would you say that he or she is typical or atypical of members of his
or her party? Explain the reasoning behind your answer. Be specific. (10
pts.)
10. Do you admire the representative? Why or why not? Be specific. (10 pts.)
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