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The most conspicuous trait of our contemporary political system is its hyper-partisanship. The 112th Congress that convened in January 2011, we are told, was the most ideologically divided body in ...

The nutritional effects of butyrate on the colonic mucosa and studies of transformed cells suggest that butyrate has anti-colon cancer effects. If butyrate has antineoplastic effects, mucosal growth contrasts between normal subjects and those with a history of colonic neoplasia would parallel changes in growth characteristics caused by butyrate in a colon neoplasia population. To test this hypothesis, rectal biopsies from a survey of colonoscopy patients (n = 50) with and without a history of colonic neoplasia (controls) were compared. Similarly, rectal biopsies were compared from subjects (n = 44) with a colon neoplasia history in an acarbose-placebo crossover trial. Control subjects in the colonoscopy survey had higher bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU) uptake than subjects with a history of neoplasia (P = 0.05). The control subjects also had a higher correlation of BrdU and Ki-67 labeling (P = 0.003). Both findings were paralleled by acarbose use. Acarbose augmented BrdU uptake (P = 0.0001) and improved the correlation of BrdU and Ki-67 labeling (P = 0.013). Acarbose also augmented fecal butyrate (P = 0.0001), which was positively correlated with Ki-67 labeling (P = 0.003). p52 antigen had an earlier pattern of crypt distribution in subjects with a history of colon neoplasia but was not affected by acarbose use. Lewis-Y antigen was expressed earlier in the crypt with acarbose but had similar expression in the colonoscopy survey groups. The use of acarbose to enhance fecal butyrate concentration produced mucosal changes paralleling the findings in control subjects as opposed to those with neoplasia, supporting the concept of an antineoplastic role for butyrate.

Committees have been a distinctive feature of the US Congress from its earliest days, and their multiple functions have attracted the interest of many scholars and commentators. Some emphasise that they enable the chambers to cope with their complex, growing workload; others note that they respond to the chambers’ party organisations; still others contend that they serve powerful clientele constituencies. The committees’ hegemony is increasingly challenged – from strengthened party leaders and from the growth of broad, cross‐cutting issues that are often resolved by a combination of committees or by extra‐committee bodies (for example, party task forces). House Republicans often circumvented committees during the 104th Congress (1995–97); although the balance of power has since been restored, committees still face potent challenges to their policy‐making dominance.

Parliaments, which according to the then prevalent scholarly literature were expected to decline in significance in the decades of the 1960s and 1970s, actually have developed new and vital political roles and, in recent decades, have innovated in their institutional structure – most recurrently in their newly organised or invigorated parliamentary committees. This is in striking contrast to the seeming antipathy between a vigorous committee system and traditional parliamentary government. There has been a growth of the centrality of committees, not only in a few parliaments, but as a global phenomenon. Even as newly democratic parliaments throughout the world experiment with more elaborate committee structures, those with older, highly developed committee systems are reaching for more varied and flexible alternatives. In short, parliamentary committees have emerged as vibrant and central institutions of democratic parliaments of today's world and have begun to define new and changing roles for themselves...

“Public opinion stands out, in the United States, as the great source of power, the master of servants who tremble before it.”1 James Bryce, perhaps the most astute foreign observer of our political life, wrote those words in 1888. Among the “servants” controlled by opinion, Bryce noted, were the president, Congress, and the political parties’ vast machinery. The systematic study of public attitudes, unknown in Bryce’s day, emerged only in the late 1930s as the tools of market research were applied to the political arena. Today’s candidates, officeholders, campaign committees, and media organizations devote vast sums to discovering and interpreting what citizens are thinking on all manner of political subjects.

“Americans are especially fond of running down their congressmen,” observed Lord Bryce in the nineteenth century. Political pundits and humorists have always singled out Congress for special attention, finding in its foibles ample material for ridicule. Serious critics, mainly scholars and journalists, fault Congress for its disorder, inertia, and corruption. Journalists zestily take members of Congress to task for their perquisites, their junkets, their money-grabbing, and even their sexual exploits. Legislators themselves often promote Congress’s shabby public image by posing to constituents as gallant warriors contending against its evils: such legislators “run for Congress by running against Congress” (Fenno, 1978).

Among all the world's national assemblies, the United States Congress is virtually unique in its legislative activism and productivity. Unlike Westminsterstyle parliamentary bodies, it writes, processes, and refines its own legislative products, relying to a large degree on "in-house" resources of member specialization and staff assistance. Congress's primacy as lawmaker is mandated by the Constitution and validated by historical experience. Focusing upon the legislative work of Congress follows Woodrow Wilson's admonition that we pay attention to "what Congress actually does and how it does it, with all its duties and all its occupations, with all its devices of management and resources of power."l Congress's agenda and workload shape not only the behavior and operations of the Senate and House of Representatives but also the two chambers' relationships with other governmental branches. Articles I and II of the Constitution are devoted largely to outlining the interwoven lawmaking duties of the legislative and executive branches-from initiation ("[The president] shall from time to time .. . recommend to [Congress's] Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient."2) to implementation ("[H]e shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed ....").3 Beginning with George Washington, purposeful presidents have always tried to insert themselves into the legislative process. Franklin D. Roosevelt and his successors institutionalized the "legislative presidency";4 today's chief executives are expected to present legislative agendas to Congress and to provide Capitol Hill allies with guidance and leadership. Congressional interactions with the judiciary are no less significant. Such encounters are, on the whole, less conspicuous than those between Congress and the White House, and until quite recently have received far less attention from scholars and other serious observers. Yet the judicial branch is in large measure a creature of Congress. Article III of the Constitution contains no less than four grants of congressional discretion. Most importantly, the Supreme Court's structure is left to statutory specification; its appellate jurisdiction is to be

The U.S. Constitution's central structural dilemma is the relationship between Congress and the president. The document itself provides little guidance for the day-to-day conduct of these relations. Although we commonly call the system “separation of powers,” it is really an arrangement of separate institutions sharing functions. A basic spirit of accommodation no doubt smooths policymaking, but the system's built-in counterweights are useful in encouraging this accommodation and forcing all the players to seek consensus. Divided government, in which the White House and one or both houses of Congress are controlled by opposing parties, has become more common in recent years. Although demanding skilled leadership in both branches, this situation need not preclude decisive and coherent policymaking. The most serious imbalance, not fully anticipated by the Founders, consists of the so-called war powers: a huge military establishment, unknown prior to World War II, gives the president a sizable advantage in making decisions about taking the nation to war. In such circumstances, how can we preserve the Founders' premise that such decisions are best left in the hands of representative assemblies?

The consensus view of today's Congress — that its decentralized structure and dispersed power has pushed it to the edge of chaos — is badly in need of correcting. Despite the legacy of decentralization and fragmentation from the 1960's and 1970's reform era, the 1980's have seen a discernible trend toward leadership and order. Leading elements of this “new centralization” in congressional operations are described in this article. These include: contraction of the legislative workload; limitations in the numbers of participants at crucial junctures; resort to omnibus “mega-bills” to enact controversial policies; high levels of partisanship in voting; resurgence of leadership, especially in the House; and subtle shifts in power within the two chambers, primarily away from authorizing committees and toward fiscal committees. Taken together, these developments denote an institution markedly more cohesive and even hierarchical than portrayed in scholarly or journalistic accounts.

Congressional committees are not little legislatures because they do not accurately reflect the full range of interests articulated in the political system or even in the parent houses. Legislators tend to seek assignments on committees which offer them career advancement; committees, in turn, are most vulnerable to interests with direct stakes in their decisions. More generalized interests are thus underrepresented—a fact which reflects the broader biases of pluralist decision making. Shifts in committee control lag behind social and political changes affecting the electorate at large. Reformers should devise measures to make committee membership more responsive to diverse political viewpoints and to subject the committees to stronger countervailing forces by exposing committee work to closer scrutiny and control by other legislators. Ultimately, intensified social and economic interdependencies may reduce this problem by equalizing the impact of any given problem upon individual constituencies.

The war on poverty has been fought on the battleground of American federalism. Because they are designed to reorient social institutions by encouraging political activity on the part of disadvantaged citizens, the antipoverty programs will be judged as much on their political as on their economic impact. Yet, for this reason, these programs have raised "ugly problems of the political establishment." The states, though largely ignored by the enabling legislation, have played a subordinate though significant role. Local political institutions have been challenged, because antipoverty programs have made great use of private nonprofit agencies, and because they have worked to foster maximum feasible participation of the disadvantaged. The history of the first five years of the programs illuminates the basic dilemma of "creative federalism": How much localized control is feasible or desirable in federally financed enterprises?

Series editors' preface Preface Introduction: institutional aspects of decision processes Part I. Representation: 1. The electoral connection and the Congress David R. Mayhew 2. The case of the vanishing marginals: the bureaucracy did it Morris P. Fiorina 3. Running scared: elections and congressional politics in the 1980s Part II. The Shape of Congressional Institutions Section 1. The Development of Institutional Arrangements: 4. The institutionalization of the US House of Representatives Nelson W. Polsby 5. A rational choice perspective on congressional norms Barry R. Weingast Section 2. Committees: 6. Congressmen and committees: a comparative analysis Richard F. Fenno, Jr. 7. Democratic committee assignments in the House of Representatives: strategic aspects of a social choice process David W. Rohde and Kenneth A. Shepsle 8. Reforming the structure of the House appropriations process: the effects of the 1885 and 1919-20 reforms on money decisions David Brady and Mark A. Morgan Section 3. Parties: 9. The decline of party in the US House of Representatives, 1887-1968 David Brady, Joseph Cooper, and Patrica A. Hurley Section 4. Leadership: 10. Joseph G. Cannon and Howard W. Smith: an essay on the limits of leadership in the House of Representatives Charles O. Jones 11. Presidential leadership in Congress: securing commitments Terry Sullivan Part III. The Impact of Institutional Arrangements: Implications for the study of Congress: 12. Votes, strategies, and institutions: an introduction to the theory of collective choice Thomas Schwartz 13. Institutional arrangements and equilibrium in multidimensional voting models Kenneth A. Shepsle 14. Sophisticated committees and structure-induced equilibria in Congress Keith Krehbiel Part IV. The Impact of Institutional Arrangements on the Development of Public Policy: 15. A theory of congressional delegation Mathew D. McCubbins and Talbot Page 16. Congressional oversight overlooked: police patrols versus fire alarms Mathew D. McCubbins and Thomas Schwartz 17. The structure of agency decision processes John A. Ferejohn 18. The political foundations of regulatory policy Roger Noll 19. Congressional influence over policy making: the case of the FTC Randall L. Calvert, Mark J. Moran, and Barry R Weingast 20. Legislators, bureaucrats, and locational decisions R. Douglas Arnold Index.