The Committee: A Study of Policy, Power, Politics and Obama’s Historic Legislative Agenda on Capitol Hill (Legislative Politics And Policy Making)

The Committee: A Study of Policy, Power, Politics and Obama’s Historic Legislative Agenda on Capitol Hill (Legislative Politics And Policy Making)

For three years while serving as a senior adviser to Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-CA), chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce—one of the most powerful committees in Congress—Bruce C. Wolpe kept a diary, a senior staffer’s look at how committees develop and promote legislation. With its insider’s view of the rough-and-tumble politics of cap-and-trade, healthcare reform, tobacco, oversight, and the debt ceiling agreement, The Committee uniquely melds the art of politics and policymaking with the theory and literature of political science. The authors engage with the important questions that political science asks about committee power, partisanship, and the strategies used to build winning policy coalitions both in the Committee and on the floor of the House. In this new edition, the authors revisit the relationship between the executive and Congress in the wake of the sweeping changes wrought by the Trump administration, as well as thoughts about how that relationship will change again as President Biden faces a 117th Congress that is strikingly similar to Obama’s 111th. The insider politics and strategies about moving legislation in Congress, from internal and external coalition building to a chairman’s role in framing policy narratives, will captivate both novice and die-hard readers of politics. “Bryan Marshall and Bruce Wolpe have produced an indispensable book on how Congress really works.” —Charles E. Cook, Jr., Editor Publisher, The Cook Political Report and Columnist, National Journal -- ―Charles E. Cook, Jr., Editor & Publisher, The Cook Political Report and Columnist, National Journal "Marshall and Wolpe bring a useful and illuminating perspective to the congressional literature by allowing readers a glimpse into the legislative sausage-making process during a seminal congressional term, while also engaging with the scholarly literature’s theoretical claims." — Congress the Presidency -- ―Congress & the Presidency "This could not have been published at a better time. Read The Committee and you'll clearly understand the machinations shaping the extraordinary legislative battles in Congress that are currently unfolding. The University of Michigan Press has timed this beautifully."  — Larry Sabato, Director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics and author of The Kennedy Half Century -- Larry Sabato Bryan W. Marshall is Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science at Miami University. Bruce C. Wolpe has served as Chief of Staff to Julia Gillard, Australia’s 27th Prime Minister and Senior Adviser to Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-CA), chair of the US House Committee on Energy and Commerce.