Question regarding US Congress Committee membership, chairmanship and ranking member between 1999 and 2020.
Dear Sir or Madam,
My name is Mirjam Grünholz, and I am a Master student at the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zürich, Switzerland. For my Master thesis, I will analyse policy-making in the US Congress with a focus on energy policy over the past 20 years.
In this context, I have been looking for information on committee membership but so far could not really find it completely, meaning for the years 1999-2020:
=> US Congress members are part of several committees. I am looking for an overview of who sits/sat in which committee, for how long, and who holds/held the chairmanship/position of the ranking member in the respective committees. I would highly appreciate your help in this regard!
I very much look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Mirjam Grünholz
Mirjam Grünholz
Master Candidate
MA Comparative and International Studies
ETH Zürich
mirjam.gruenholz@gess.ethz.ch
Answer
Thank you for your question. Sorry we took so long to respond—your message was sent to our spam folder for some reason!
Here are some sources that may be helpful in researching committee assignments for the 106th Congress:
The Congressional Directory is the main source of information about members of congress and their committee assignments. It is published every two years at the beginning of each two-year congress.
Congressional Directory for the 106th Congress: https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/CDIR-1999-06-15/context
A note at the beginning of each volume indicates changes that have occurred since the previous volume was published, so you might want to check the note at the beginning of the volume for the 107th Congress: https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CDIR-2002-10-01/pdf/CDIR-2002-10-01-FRONTMATTER.pdf
These publications may also contain useful information:
The U.S. House of Representatives website includes a collection of several downloadable documents that profile the House during 106th Congress. These include member information and committee information (click on the relevant tabs to see a list of documents): https://history.house.gov/Congressional-Overview/Profiles/106th/
The U.S. Senate historical page (https://www.senate.gov/committees/history.htm) doesn’t go back to the 106th Congress, but the following documents summarize committee assignments for the 106th Congress:
U.S. Senate. Committee and Subcommittee Assignments for the One Hundred Sixth Congress (S. Pub. 106-30) (February 17, 2000): https://hdl.handle.net/2027/pur1.32754071530996
U.S. Senate. Committee and Subcommittee Assignments for the One Hundred Sixth Congress (S. Pub. 106-51) (December 7, 2000): https://hdl.handle.net/2027/pur1.32754070202258
See also Chairmen of Senate Standing Committees (1789–present): https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/resources/pdf/CommitteeChairs.pdf
OpenSecrets.org indicates the chair and ranking member of each committee, and the member profiles for each committee (accessible by clicking a tab at the top of the screen) show how long they were in office and give information about their finances: https://www.opensecrets.org/cong-cmtes?cong=106
I hope this information is helpful. If this is not what you need, or if you should require any further assistance, please let us know.
Bobby Griffith
Lead Government Information Reference Associate
Eagle Commons Library
University of North Texas Libraries
Bobby.Griffith@unt.edu