An Update on the Senate Democratic Policy Committee

Abstract

The United States Congress has long been known for its lack of partisan cohesiveness and the inability of its majority parties to formulate and enact programs of policy. In the modern era (since the 1930s), policy leadership in the national government has come largely from the executive branch during the few periods of reasonably unified party rule (Roosevelt's New Deal, Johnson's Great Society). Over the past 35 years, the prevalence of divided government of a particular sort (Republican presidents with Democratic congressional majorities) has highlighted the internal divisions and lack of centralized power among congressional Democrats. There is, therefore, a natural interest in instruments of party leadership that are designed to offset the tendencies toward fragmentation and parochialism in Congress. The focus of this paper is on the Senate Democratic Policy Committee.The Senate's version of the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1946 included provisions for the establishment of party policy committees. This legislation stemmed largely from the work of the Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress, known as the LaFollette-Monroney Committee. The Joint Committee's report called for the establishment of policy committees “to formulate overall legislative policy of the two parties” (Bone 1956, 342). The Committee's work was informed by, and part of, an active reform effort at that time (which included many political scientists) aimed at bringing about stronger parties that could be held accountable for certain policy outcomes (see for example Committee on Congress, American Political Science Association 1945; Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress 1946; Galloway 1946; Committee on Political Parties, American Political Science Association 1950).