258 CHAPTER 9|CONGRESS
have become muted as senators seem to campaign for re-election 365 days a year,
every year, just like House members.^1 This “permanent campaign” means that
senators are less insulated from electoral forces than previously.
The relationship between the president and Congress has also evolved sig-
nif icantly. Congress’s roots in geographic constituencies made it well suited for
the politics of the nineteenth century. Early in U.S. history several great presi-
dents left their mark on national politics (George Washington, Andrew Jack-
son, and Abraham Lincoln, among others), but Congress dominated much of the
day-to-day politics, which revolved around issues such as the tariff (taxes on
imported or exported goods), slavery, and interna l improvements such as build-
ing roads and canals. Given the tendency to address these issues with patron-
age and the pork barrel (that is, jobs and policies targeted to benefit specific
constituents), Congress was better suited for the task than the president was.
Beginning around the turn of the twentieth century and accelerating with
the New Deal of the 1930s (which established modern social welfare and regu-
latory policies), the scope of national policy expanded and politics became more
centered in Washington. With this nationalization of politics and the increas-
ing importance of national security issues, the president has assumed a more
central policy-making role. However, the tensions between representing local
versus national interests remain key in understanding the legislative process
and the relationship between members of Congress and their constituents.Congress and the People
Americans have a love–hate relationship with Congress; that is, we generally love our
own member of Congress, but we hate the Congress as a whole. Well, hate is a strong
word, but as we show later in this section, individua l members of Congress routinely
have approval ratings 30 to 40 points higher than the institution’s. Before explaining
that puzzling pattern, we’ll explore the nature of representation in Congress.Representation and the Constituency
It may seem obvious why members of Congress are called “representatives,” but
that role is more complex than you might imagine. Factors that infl uence this com-
plexity include the diff erent ways in which the members can represent the citizens
who elected them to offi ce, and the diff erent characteristics, desires, and needs of
the district populations that each member represents.TYPES OF REPRESENTATION
First let’s examine the two basic components of the relationship between a con-
stituency and its member of Congress: descriptive representation and substantive
representation. The former is rooted in the politician’s side of the relationship:
Does the member of Congress “look like” his or her constituents in demographic
terms—for example, African American, Latino, or white; male or female; Catho-EXPLAIN HOW MEMBERS
OF CONGRESS REPRESENT
THEIR CONSTITUENTS AND
HOW ELECTIONS HOLD
MEMBERS ACCOUNTABLEpork barrel Legislative appro-
priations that benefi t specifi c
constituents, created with the aim
of helping local representatives win
re-election.