Intermission

On September 17, California Governor Culbert L. Olson mailed a letter of protest to the US Senate subcommittee on motion-picture propaganda. Addressing the letter to senator and subcommittee chairman D. Worth Clark, Olson wrote on behalf of the home state of Hollywood that California “looks with disfavor upon the implications of your committee’s investigation, not because this important industry of our state has anything to fear from such investigation, but because the investigation itself is considered an unjustifiable attack upon it.”...

Key House Member Makes a Conservative's Case for Water Projects

The White House and Democrats want to see an infrastructure package move through Congress. One House subcommittee chairman intends to make sure that water resource projects are part of the plan.

Subcommittees: The Miniature Legislatures of Congress

Woodrow Wilson spoke of the “little legislatures of Congress,” in referring to House and Senate standing committees. Perhaps it is not out of place, then, to call subcommittees the “miniature legislatures.” Little systematic academic attention has been given them since Burton French's discussion in this Review in 1915. They are worth understanding, however, for subcommittees often leave an indelible mark on legislation. As one Congressional staff member stated, “Given an active subcommittee chairman working in a specialized field with a staff of his own, the parent committee can do no more than change the grammar of a subcommittee report.” This article deals with the reasons for the existence and growth of subcommittees, with the variety of ways in which they are organized, and with the issues and methods involved in their control. Conference committees are outside the scope of this study.