Description
The Senate majority and minority leaders stand at the pinnacle of American national government – as important to Congress as the speaker of the House. However, the invention of Senate floor leadership has, until now, been entirely unknown. Providing a sweeping account of the emergence of party organization and leadership in the US Senate, Steering the Senate is the first-ever study to examine the development of the Senate's main governing institutions. It argues that three forces – party competition, intraparty factionalism, and entrepreneurship – have driven innovation in the Senate. The book details how the position of floor leader was invented in 1890 and then strengthened through the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Drawing on the full history of the Senate, this book immediately becomes the authoritative source for understanding the institutional development of the Senate – uncovering the origins of the Senate party caucuses, steering committees, and floor leadership.
Table of Contents
1. Individual goals and senate party organization; 2. Presiding officer, 1789–1914; 3. Caucus, 1789–1879; 4. Steering Committee, 1856–1913; 5. Arthur Pue Gorman, the Federal Elections Bill, and the invention of Elected Floor Leadership, 1890–1913; 6. Leaders and whips, 1913–1924; 7. Divergent paths and the consolidation of leadership structures, 1923–1944; 8. Party infrastructure, 1945–1980; 9. Polarization, competition, and centralization, 1981–2024; 10. Conclusion; Appendix.
