Discover Government

Legislative

     The Legislative Branch is made up of congress. Congress is broken down into a bicambral system where there are two houses in congress, the House of Representatives and the Senate.

House of Representatives

     The House of Representatives is made up of 435 members divided up among the states based on population of the states. To be a member of the House of representatives you must be 25 years old, be a citizen of the United States for 7 years and live in the state and district you represent. Members of the House serve for 2 year terms but are not restricted to the number of terms they can have. 

Senate

      The Senate is composed of 100 members that are devided up among the states equaly so that each state has 2 Senators.  To be a Senetor you must be 30 Years old, live in the state you will be representing, and be a United States citizen for 9 years.  Senetors hold 6 year terms and are also not restricted on how many terms they can hold.

Salary and Benefits

     The average salary for both the House of Representatives and the Senate is $174,000.  They also get good retierment and health care benefits, but they have to pay their own social security.

Congressional Committees

     Congressional committees are groups with in one branch of congress or the other, that are in charge of taking the first look at a bill that deals with their committees specialty and revice it before it is voted on by all of the Senate or all of the House. Examples of a committee is the committee of agriculture, and within that committee there are subcommittees within the committee of agriculture that are in diferent areas of agriculture like dairy, tabacoo, and tropical to name a few.  Committees are what make congress run the way it does because if they did not have committees it would take even longer to pass a bill and it takes a long time as it is.