eBook

Fighting for the speakership

CHARLES STEWART, JEFFERY A. JENKINS

2012,2013,2015

Overview

The Speaker of the House of Representatives is the most powerful partisan figure in the contemporary U.S. Congress. How this came to be, and how the majority party in the House has made control of the speakership a routine matter, is far from straightforward.Fighting for the Speakershipprovides a comprehensive history of how Speakers have been elected in the U.S. House since 1789, arguing that the organizational politics of these elections were critical to the construction of mass political parties in America and laid the groundwork for the role they play in setting the agenda of Congress today. Jeffery Jenkins and Charles Stewart show how the speakership began as a relatively weak office, and how votes for Speaker prior to the Civil War often favored regional interests over party loyalty. While struggle, contention, and deadlock over House organization were common in the antebellum era, such instability vanished with the outbreak of war, as the majority party became an \"organizational cartel\" capable of controlling with certainty the selection of the Speaker and other key House officers. This organizational cartel has survived Gilded Age partisan strife, Progressive Era challenge, and conservative coalition politics to guide speakership elections through the present day.Fighting for the Speakershipreveals how struggles over House organization prior to the Civil War were among the most consequential turning points in American political history.

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Subject: 112th United States Congress / 1840 / 1860 / 1KBB / Activism / Adjournment / Amendment / Ballot / Candidate / Caucus / Chairman / Committee / Committee of the Whole (United States House of Representatives) / Congress / Congressional caucus / Congressional Record / Conservative coalition / Conservative Democrat / Defection / Dennis Hastert / Election / Electoral College (United States) / First Party System / Francis Preston Blair / Front-runner / HBJK / HISTORY / History & Theory / HISTORY / United States / General / House / House Leader / Incumbent / Institution / Jacksonian democracy / John Boehner / JPA / JPHL / JPL / Leadership / Legislation / Legislator / Legislature / Major party / Majority / Majority leader / Majority rule / Martin Van Buren / Member of Congress / Midterm election / National Republican Party / Newt Gingrich / Nomination / Party leader / Party system / Party systems / Party-line vote / Plantation era / Point of order / Political actors / Political Parties / Political parties -- United States -- History / Political party / Political Process / Political representation / POLITICAL SCIENCE / POLITICAL SCIENCE / General / POLITICAL SCIENCE / History & Theory / POLITICAL SCIENCE / Public Policy / General / Political systems / Politician / Politics / Presidential nominee / Previous question / Reconstruction Era / Second Party System / Secret ballot / Select committee / Slavery / Southern Democrats / Speakers / State legislature (United States) / Supermajority / Tariff / Two-party system / U.S.A / Unanimous consent / United States / United States congressional committee / United States House of Representatives / United States presidential election / United States presidential election, 1840 / United States presidential election, 1860 / United States Senate / United States. Congress. House / United States. Congress. House -- Speakers -- History / Voting / Whig Party (United States) / Whigs (British political party) / Woodrow Wilson
• ISBN: 9780691156446, 0691156441, 0691118124, 9780691118123, 9781400845460, 1400845467