Precongressional Careers and Committees: The Impact of Congruence

Abstract

We explore the impact that precongressional careers have on the behavior of new members in the U.S. House of Representatives. Does a former doctor act differently in the House than a former state legislator, lawyer, or businesswoman? Is the former doctor more productive as a new member if assigned to a committee that utilizes his or her perceived and actual experiences in the medical field? We posit that new members who are assigned to committees that align with their career experiences are more active legislators and obtain legislative expertise more quickly than other new members of Congress (MCs), with implications for their future political ambition. To explore these claims, we collected an extensive dataset of the precongressional career experiences of first and second term MCs from the 101st-113th Congresses (1989-2014), their committee assignments, legislative activity, and political ambition. We find that MCs with career-committee congruence have a legislative advantage compared with other new MCs, influencing their transition and trajectory in Congress. Many MCs matched with the right committee are more likely to introduce legislation in their policy area. In addition, we provide some evidence that MCs obtain committee leadership positions more often than their peers without the same early advantage.

Keywords

Congress House of Representatives legislative behavior career

Richard Fenno (1978) once observed that, in their districts, members of Congress (MCs) do “what they are experienced, comfortable, and talented at doing” (p. 127). Does this hold true on Capitol Hill? MCs leave other jobs to enter Congress, and they sometimes draw connections between their prior careers and Congress. For example, Mike Collins, a 2014 Republican House candidate from Georgia, introduced himself to voters by pairing his experience as the owner of a trucking business with his desire for congressional change. As his campaign advertisements stated,

At 15 he overhauled his first engine, by 25 he bought his first truck. Today Mike Collins is a successful businessman with a whole fleet of trucks. Mike believes Washington needs an overhaul. (Cahn, 2014)

Candidates may point to past career experiences on the campaign trail and voters may select candidates with regard to them, but do these career experiences matter in Congress? New MCs have a variety of career experiences before serving in office—everything from teaching, running a business, practicing medicine, trying cases, to working as a street magician in Switzerland, among other things.¹ Nevertheless, we know little about how these career experiences relate to legislative behavior of new members in Congress or the broader, institutional implications.

We address that deficit here by identifying the career experiences that new members of the U.S. House of Representatives have had in their adult lives prior to serving in Congress and connecting those experiences to members’ committee assignments and legislative activity in their first and second terms in office during the 101st-113th Congresses (1989-2014). We focus on these connections because legislative activity is central to what Congress does, legislative committees are where that work occurs, and career experiences play a role in the committees to which new members are assigned (Frisch & Kelly, 2006; Hall, 1996; Shepsle, 1978). We concentrate on new members’ first and second terms in office because it is a significant time in the transition to Congress, a period during which new members may draw on past experiences to guide their decisions and actions.

We argue that congressional careers provide insights and experience that tie into the legislative business of Congress. We expect that new members who are assigned to committees that are relevant to their precongressional careers face lower barriers to developing legislative expertise and to engaging in legislative activity. We anticipate that new MCs with career-committee congruence will be more active and successful legislators than their peers without this congruence. In addition, MCs with congruence will be less likely to attempt to move onto higher office, preferring to stay in the House where they can continue that work and, thus, more likely to obtain committee leadership positions.

Why should we care about the legislative activity of these inexperienced MCs? For one, it represents the efforts of legislators acting out of their areas of expertise, and thus, it is less likely to include symbolic pieces of legislation that lack policy merits.² For another, MCs with career-committee congruence have the opportunity and responsibility to oversee the bureaucracies that will enforce this, or similar, legislation. These MCs are prime candidates for carrying out “police patrol” legislative oversight, and so it is of interest to know whether they are participating in an earlier stage of the policymaking process (McCubbins & Schwartz, 1984). Finally, the diversity of careers that MCs have had before office far surpasses the diversity evident in the chambers on other important dimensions like gender, race, ethnicity, religion, and education. MCs’ prior congressional careers point to what James Madison described in the Federalist Papers as the extended sphere of representation and the resulting diversity of leadership (Madison, 2003). We believe that studying career-committee congruence can tell us something important about what may help to spur legislative activity and success. Given that Americans are both frustrated with the current state of gridlock in federal politics and Congress in general, these are timely concerns.

In the sections below, we lay out our expectations for what we call career-committee congruence. Next, we overview how we test those expectations and then present our analysis, which supports our overall hypothesis that career experiences influence the legislative behavior of new members in the House of Representatives. Given that nearly half (49%) of all MCs in our dataset have had state legislative experience, we also look at the impact of this prior experience. Finally, we conclude by discussing implications for this relationship and noting future steps.

The Nexus of Careers and Committee Assignments

New MCs’ previous career experiences are beneficial to individual MCs, party leaders, and the party’s electoral fortune (Frisch & Kelly, 2006; Shepsle, 1978). New MCs with applicable career experiences should possess knowledge and interest in topics over which specific committees have jurisdiction (i.e., former teachers and the Education and the Workforce committee). For example, in her first term in office (111th Congress), Representative Kathy Dahlkemper (D-PA), a former dietician and perceived as knowledgeable on health-related issues, introduced six bills on the House floor that pertained to medical or health-related topics (compared with the average of one health-related bill per MC). Along the same lines, the only bill that Representative Steve Southerland (R-FL) introduced during his first term in Congress (112th Congress) was about funeral and burial arrangements, an odd choice if he had not been the co-owner and president of Southerland Family Funeral Homes before running for Congress (Skotzko, 2011).

As these examples suggest, career-committee congruence can encourage legislative activity.³ Even the perception of being skilled and knowledgeable in a certain policy area may benefit new MCs as fellow members defer to their expertise. Members lacking information on policies outside of their own area of specialization often look to other MCs, especially to those who they view as particularly knowledgeable, for information and direction when making legislative decisions (Box-Steffensmeier, Ryan, & Sokhey, 2015; Curry, 2015; Kingdon, 1989; Matthews & Stimson, 1975).

Career-committee congruence can benefit other notable individual and party goals. MCs’ previous experience provides a tangible record for leaders to assess the intensity and direction of new MCs’ preferences, and to gauge the sincerity of their requests and their likelihood of being faithful agents for the party (Gertzog, 1976; Kanthak, 2007; Munger, 1988).⁴ For another, just as a new MC wants to ensure her reelection, party leaders want to ensure that they can keep the member’s seat for the party. Assigning a new MC to a committee that is a good match with his career background may help to alleviate electoral concerns on the part of the party and individual.⁵

As a result, we anticipate that members with relevant career experience are more likely to be assigned to the associated committee than other members (Hypothesis 1). In this way, career-committee congruence is akin to a legislative subsidy for new MCs interested in pursuing policy goals—beneficial for both the member and her party (Hall, 1996).

We anticipate that these career experiences have a continued effect on members’ behavior after the initial assignment is made.⁶ If career experiences provide policy insights and ideas, this should make it easier for new MCs to introduce bills on those topics, compared with other new MCs, and to shape these bills throughout the committee process. New MCs serving on committees related to their career experiences are well situated to make substantial and meaningful policy contributions. As a result, we hypothesize that new MCs with career-committee congruence will introduce a greater number of bills on these topics than other new MCs (Hypothesis 2).⁷

Furthermore, career-committee congruence may also affect the outcome of these bill introductions. New MCs assigned to committees aligned with their previous careers effectively have lower barriers to entry along many steps of the policy process; career-committee congruence ideally situates these members to be effective legislative entrepreneurs (Wawro, 2001). We hypothesize that new MCs with career-committee congruence who introduce related bills are more likely to see those bills become law, especially because they serve on (at least one of) the committee(s) with jurisdiction over the bill (Hypothesis 3).

Finally, we anticipate that this enhanced legislative activity and success has longer term benefits as, over time, it may accumulate into substantial legislative expertise and specialization (Asher, 1973; Fenno, 1973; Kingdon, 1984; Matthews, 1960; Schiller, 1995; Wawro, 2001). This division of labor can increase MCs’ power within the chamber and enhance the efficiency of congressional policymaking. New MCs with career-committee congruence are thus well suited to become legislative specialists.

If new MCs with career-committee congruence are among the quintessential “work horses” of Congress, we hypothesize that two associated outcomes will result: These members will be more likely to obtain a committee leadership position and be less likely to run for the Senate or other higher office (Hypothesis 4). Although MCs could make important policy contributions in the Senate or other higher offices, these “work horses” may be averse to the risk inherent in these attempted career moves—that they lose and have no ability to work on policy. Consider Representative Paul Broun’s failed attempt to secure the Republican Party’s nomination for Georgia’s open U.S. Senate seat in 2014. In seeking to move to a higher office, he forfeited his seat with Georgia’s 10th Congressional district. He has since tried to reclaim a place in the House but lost a 2016 primary election in Georgia’s 9th Congressional District. So, rather than lose what they have worked hard to gain, we posit that MCs who have career-committee congruence in their early terms will have an early advantage allowing them to cut a different path through Congress—one that emphasizes legislative work in the House.⁸

We anticipate that the benefits of career-committee congruence may be pronounced for those new MCs with previous state legislative experience. State legislative experience is a common pathway to Congress; from 1989-2013, 448 of 920 MCs (49%) served as state legislators (among other things) before being elected to the House. Previous scholars have noted the broad impact of state legislative experience on MC’s congressional behavior—like their risk aversion, ability to fundraise, and, particularly for our purposes, their mastery of policymaking (e.g., see Berkman, 1993; Berkman & Eisenstein, 1999). As a result, we expect that former state legislators enter Congress with a honed ability to leverage their committee assignments into producing legislative work. We hypothesize that former state legislators assigned to House committees that align with their other, nonlegislative job experiences (what we are calling career-committee congruence) are more successful and specialized legislators than other former state legislators without this same congruence.⁹

As a result, if our hypotheses are supported, our analysis adds to our knowledge of which MCs contribute meaningfully to the policy work of Congress. This matters for a number of reasons: the institutional productivity of the chamber, the ability of the party to aid its own members, and, perhaps, members’ satisfaction with their position. Although we are not making sweeping claims about all members, we are providing a unique perspective on legislative activity and success in the House—one that links members’ lives before Congress with their work and actions in Congress. Given that Congress is only one part of an individuals’ lifelong career, we argue that this comprehensive perspective helps us better understand how individuals adapt to a demanding environment and represent their constituents.

Data and Methods

Our analysis spans 25 years and 920 members of the U.S. House of Representatives. We collected data on every House member in their first and (if applicable) second term during the 101st-113th Congresses (1989-2014).¹⁰ Our unit of observation is an MC–Congress pair (one MC in one Congress). MCs are entered into our dataset twice if they are reelected after their first term—once for the first Congress and once for the second Congress—So we have 1,622 observations. Given that MCs can be in the dataset twice, we cluster the standard errors on the individual member to account for any correlation in the error terms.

Measuring Career-Committee Congruence: Independent Variables

Our key independent variable is career-committee congruence, a 0/1 indicator variable that indicates (“1”) that the new MC was assigned to a legislative committee that aligned with at least one of their precongressional career experiences. To determine this, first, we recorded every precongressional job listed for MCs in the Almanac of American Politics and the Congressional Biographical Directory.¹¹

Following the example of Fox and Lawless (2005), the Congressional Research Service (Manning, 2012), and Carnes (2013), we code MCs’ career experiences into the following categories (the appendix provides a fuller description): agriculture, business, city official, congressional staff, county official, consulting, education, entertainment, federal official, judge, lobbyist, manual work, media, medical, military/law enforcement, nonprofit, party official, private attorney, public attorney, religious, school board, social worker, state employee, state legislator, sports, union official, White House staff, and miscellaneous (e.g., airline pilots, substance abuse counselor, child care specialist, etc.). For instance, Judy Chu (D-CA), prior to her election to the House, served as a city official, a 3-time Mayor of Monterey Park City, California, and was elected to a number of state-level positions. Tom Price (R-GA) worked as an orthopedic surgeon for decades prior to running for Congress. He also worked as an assistant professor of orthopedic surgery at Emory University and served Georgia state legislature before being elected to the House. On average, new MCs have three career experiences before entering Congress. Figure 1 details the most common of these career experiences.

Figure 1.

New MCs’ precongressional career experiences.

We matched MCs’ career experiences to their committee assignments to create our independent variable of interest. Central to our analysis is determining which career experiences are congruent with which committee assignments.¹² For example, given Tom Price’s past experience with higher education, he is coded as having career-committee congruence during his freshman term for our dataset because he was assigned to the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. Judy Chu did not have the same congruence advantage during her sophomore term, serving on the Judiciary and Small Business committees. Table 1 comprehensively lists our pairings of career experiences and committee assignments, as well as the number of new MCs assigned to a committee that aligned with their career experiences. All told, 297 of the 920 (32%) new MCs had career-committee congruence in at least one term. Of these MCs, 59% were Republicans, 61% served in the majority party, and 58% were in their first term.¹³

Table 1.

Pairings of Congressional Committees and Precongressional Careers.

Career experience	Relevant committee	Related bill topics	District-specific controls	Number of MCs with experience	Number of MCs with experience on committee
Farming, ranching	Agriculture	Agriculture	% of district that is rural	42	24
Military	Armed Services	Defense	% of district that is veterans	209	61
Financial	Financial Services	Macroeconomics; banking, finance, and domestic commerce	% of district in white-collar jobs	64	18
Education	Education and the Workforce	Education	District median income	172	30
Education—college experience	Education and the Workforce	Education	District median income	107	25
Military	Foreign Affairs	Defense	% of district that is veterans	209	15
Legal	Judiciary	Law, crime, and family issues	District median income	339	61
Law enforcement	Judiciary	Law, crime, and family issues	District poverty %	14	2
Business	Small Business	Macroeconomics; banking, finance, and domestic commerce	% of district in white-collar jobs; district median income	271	65
Education—college teacher	Science, Space, and Technology	Space, science, technology, and communications	% of district in white-collar jobs; district median income	107	24
Medical	Energy and Commerce	Health	% of district 65 years or older; district median income	50	6
Military	Veterans’ Affairs	Community development and housing issues	% of district that is veterans	209	36

Source. Frisch and Kelly (2006) and Shepsle (1978).

Note. Policy topics were categorized and taken from the Policy Agendas Project. Veteran’s Affairs topics are included in the defense category, according to the Policy Agendas Project. Finally, we take into consideration a number of other factors that may influence MCs’ committee assignments and legislative behavior. We control for district characteristics that may influence assignment to each committee we study (e.g., when looking at assignment to the Agriculture committee, we take into consideration the percentage of the district that is rural, as noted in Table 1). More generally, we also include size of state delegation, membership in the majority party (0/1), first year (0/1), party affiliation (0/1, where democrat = 1), percentage of vote share of two-party vote, member’s ideological position (first dimension common space NOMINATE score). MCs = members of Congress.

Measuring Legislative Activity and Political Ambition: Dependent Variables

Our main outcome variables fall into two broad categories: legislative activity and expressed political ambition. For measures of legislative activity, we recorded the number of public House bills that each MC introduced per Congress per topic and the total number of MCs’ bills that became public law.¹⁴ Table 2 lists the major policy topics and the number of bills introduced by policy area. During this time period, new MCs introduced a total of 15,189 House bills, or an average of nine to 10 bills per Congress, of which 599 became law.¹⁵ MCs typically introduce bills in five different policy topics.

Table 2.

House Introductions of New MCs 101st-113th Congress by Policy Topic.

Policy topic	Total number of introductions
Government operations	1,851
Public lands and water management	1,491
Health	1,469
Foreign trade	1,107
Defense	1,158
Banking, finance, and domestic commerce	1,099
Law, crime, and family issues	952
Education	823
Macroeconomics	755
Environment	680
Energy	609
Transportation	542
Labor and employment	502
Agriculture	429
Community development and housing	385
Social welfare	343
International affairs and foreign aid	266
Civil rights, minority issues, and civil liberties	259
Immigration	248
Space, science, technology and communications	221

Source. Policy Agendas Project.

Note. The table counts only House bills, not House Joint Resolutions or House Resolutions. MCs = members of Congress.

In general, new MCs served an average of 9 years in Congress. We recorded whether MCs were elected to the Senate (0/1), whether they become a subcommittee chair, and whether they become a full committee chair.¹⁶ At the start of the 114th Congress, 357 new MCs were still serving in Congress. After their initial two terms, we observe differences in the trajectories of new MCs’ congressional careers: 58 went on to be elected to the Senate, and others obtained an array of higher offices like ambassadors, governors, and cabinet secretaries. Eventually, 62 MCs became committee chairs, and 361 new MCs became subcommittee chair.

Results

We begin by explaining the likelihood of career-committee congruence, taking our key independent variable as the dependent variable. We use probit regression to test our first hypothesis (new members with relevant career experiences are more likely to be assigned to the committee than are other new members), controlling for individual and district characteristics. We estimate a separate probit regression for each committee of interest, as detailed in Table 3.

Table 3.

Predicting Career-Committee Congruence for New MCs.

Career experience	Committee assigned to	Coefficient	SE	p value
Farming, ranching	Agriculture	0.809	0.213	.00
Military	Armed Services	0.533	0.125	.00
Financial	Financial Services	0.283	0.16	.077
Education	Education and the Workforce	0.145	0.133	.278
Education—college administration or teacher	Education and the Workforce	0.419	0.148	.005
Military	Foreign Affairs	−0.213	0.152	.162
Legal	Judiciary	1.179	0.155	.00
Law enforcement	Judiciary	0.082	0.411	.842
Business	Small Business	0.188	0.113	.096
Education—college experience	Science, Space, and Technology	0.047	0.171	.785
Medical	Energy and Commerce	0.616	0.206	.003
Military	Veterans’ Affairs	0.333	0.148	.024

Note. Each table row is a separate probit regression analysis, with clustered standard errors given that MCs may be in the dataset twice, for their first and second term. Each regression analysis controls for the topic/committee specific factors outlined in Table 1 and for the following: was MC a democrat (0/1), size of state delegation, MCs’ vote share in that election, was MC in the majority party (0/1), was MC in their first term (0/1), did MC ever serve as a congressional staffer (0/1), did MC have state legislative experience (0/1), and MCs’ first dimension common space NOMINATE score for that Congress. Full regression results can be found in the appendix. The bold-faced values represent p value <.10. MCs = members of Congress.

Looking at Table 3, we see that many new MCs with specific career experiences are more likely to be assigned to the committee. This is true for nearly all (eight of 12) of the career experiences we examine, for example, farming or ranching experience and assignment to the Agriculture committee.¹⁷ The full regression results in the appendix demonstrate that this holds true even when controlling for a host of other potential influences on assignment to that committee, for example, the rural–urban nature of a district and serving on the Agriculture committee.¹⁸

The results are nuanced, however. For instance, one surprising omission was education experience and assignment to the Education and Labor committee. Initially, we matched any education experience (elementary through university, instructional, and administrative) to this committee. In hindsight, we reconsidered the possibility that some types of education experience—such as at the university level—played more directly into being assigned to the committee. Indeed, this is what we find, as shown in Table 3.

For similar reasons, collegiate education experience alone (absent knowledge of the academic specialization) may not be sufficient to predict assignment to the Science and Technology committee. But what about law enforcement and military experience? We posit that two factors may be in play. First, whereas law enforcement experience certainly maps onto judicial issues, legal experience may be (and is) a better predictor of the type of work the committee does. Second, and especially in the case of the Foreign Affairs committee, there may be some committees to which ambitious legislators from a variety of career backgrounds seek assignment, especially if they confer greater national recognition or more public opportunities for credit claiming. To reiterate, although, for the vast majority (75%) of the career-committee pairs we examine, related career experience significantly predicts assignment to the related committee.

Not only are MCs’ career experiences related to their committee assignments, but we also see an influence of career-committee congruence once members are assigned to these committees. Table 4 shows that, in general, MCs with career-committee congruence introduce more bills on the policy topic related to the career-relevant committee than other MCs (both new MCs on the same committee and not on it). We see an increase in legislative activity for MCs with career-committee congruence across a wide range of pairings of policy topics and career experiences: veterans and defense and international affairs policy, financial experience and financial and macroeconomic policy, education and education policy, legal experience and law, crime and family policy, law enforcement experience and law, crime, and family policy, business experience and financial policy, and, finally, medical experience and health policy.¹⁹

Table 4.

Influence of Career-Committee Congruence on Number of Policy Relevant Bills Introduced by MCs.

Career experience	Committee assigned to	Policy topic of bills	Coefficient	SE	p value
Farming/ranching	Agriculture	Agriculture	0.361	0.18	.045
Military	Armed Services	Defense	0.309	0.144	.033
Financial	Financial Services	Macroeconomics	0.393	0.237	.098
Financial	Financial Services	Banking, finance, and domestic commerce	0.508	0.209	.015
Education—college administration or teacher	Education and the Workforce	Education	1.04	0.409	.012
Military	Foreign Affairs	Defense	0.408	0.172	.018
Legal	Judiciary—legal experience	Law, crime, and family issues	0.734	0.215	.001
Law enforcement	Judiciary—law enforcement	Law, crime, and family issues	1.595	0.093	.00
Business	Small Business	Macroeconomics	0.058	0.08	.471
Business	Small Business	Banking, finance, and domestic commerce	0.214	0.112	.055
Education—college	Science, Space, and Technology	Space, science, technology, and communications	0.246	0.158	.119
Medical	Energy and Commerce	Health	2.2	0.731	.003
Military	Veterans’ Affairs	Community development and housing issues	0.016	0.106	.884

Note. Each table row is a separate OLS regression analysis, with clustered standard errors given that MCs may be in the dataset twice, for their first and second term. Each regression analysis controls for the topic/committee-specific factors outlined in Table 1 and for the following: MCs’ vote share in that election, was MC in the majority party (0/1), did MC serve a partial term (0/1), total number of bills MC introduced in that Congress, was MC in their first term (0/1), did MC ever serve as a congressional staffer (0/1), did MC have state legislative experience (0/1), MCs’ first dimension common space NOMINATE score for that Congress, was MC a woman (0/1), was MC White (0/1), and MC’s level of education (5 = graduate level, 1 = <HS degree). Full regression results can be found in the appendix. The bold-faced values represent p value <.10. MCs = members of Congress; OLS = ordinary least squares; HS = high school.

Again, these results control for a number of other related considerations, such as ideology or the number of bills a member introduces in total. Consider the Education committee. The Education and the Workforce committee—education experience—and education policy nexus, in some ways, pose a hard test for our hypothesis. All MCs have personally attended school (most of whom have graduate degrees), and many have the additional experience of parenting children who attend school. Thus, like Burden (2007) argues, there are many personal bases for representation and policy action. Nevertheless, we see that new MCs with college education professional experience outpace their peers in terms of education policy introductions. Career-committee congruence, in other words, can be profitably translated into policy action.²⁰

We examine the influence of career-committee congruence on legislative success in Table 5. Overall, new MCs still face significant barriers to seeing their legislation become law, even when they are assigned to committees that match their career experiences. Given that nearly half of new MCs in our dataset were state legislators at some point before Congress, we looked at the effect of career-committee congruence among state legislators. In some ways, this may be a hard test of our expectations, given that state legislative experience has similarities to serving in Congress. Thus, state legislative experience may effectively cancel out the effect of being assigned to a committee that matches an individual’s career experience. At the same time, we expect that these experiences are additive, the lessons from different experiences build off each other. Therefore, we expect that former state legislators are more likely to be assigned to committees that match their other career experiences and that former state legislators with career-committee congruence are more active and successful in introducing bills on these topics than other former state legislators.

Table 5.

Influence of Career-Committee Congruence on Number of MCs’ Bills That Become Law.

	Coefficient	SE	p value	Coefficient	SE	p value
Any career-committee congruence	0.018	0.039	.635	0.029	0.039	.449
In majority party	0.207	0.033	.00	0.21	0.033	.00
Vote share	0.002	0.002	.348	0.001	2	.422
Freshmen	−0.038	0.036	.292	−0.044	0.036	.228
White	−0.058	0.063	.356	−0.064	0.062	.301
Woman	−0.035	0.049	.473	−0.037	0.048	.445
Total number of introductions	0.02	0.004	.00	0.02	0.004	.00
Ideological position	0.133	0.061	.029	0.154	0.061	.011
Constant	0.015	0.163	.927	0.18	0.064	.005

Note. n = 909. Each table row is a separate OLS regression analysis, with clustered standard errors given that MCs may be in the dataset twice, for their first and second term. The bold-faced values represent p value <.10. MCs = members of Congress; OLS = ordinary least squares.

To assess this, we reran our analyses for committee assignment, legislative introductions, and legislative success among the sample of former state legislators only. (Because we ran a unique model for each committee, this makes the omitted category former state legislators without career-committee congruence on that committee.) We control for the professionalization of the state legislature, in the instance that state legislators from more professionalized bodies find it easier to navigate legislative politics in Congress, considering that legislative experience before Congress may influence legislative behavior in Congress (see, for instance, Berkman, 1993; Squire, 2007).²¹

An underlying theme that emerges from the results (the full summary of the results can be found in the appendix) is that even former state legislators get a boost from career-committee congruence. Former state legislators with relevant experience were more likely to be assigned to the Agriculture, Armed Services, and Judicial committees.²² Note that the comparison here is to all former state legislators, a group of experienced politicians who encountered similar issues and should understand the value of identifying with issue publics in their constituency. In addition, there are some real gains when it comes to actual bill introductions. State legislators elected to Congress and assigned to the career-relevant committee introduced more agricultural, foreign affairs, judicial, and medical bills than other former state legislators now serving in Congress. Nevertheless, former state legislators face the same legislative obstacles to getting their bills passed into law as other new MCs, and, contrary to our initial expectations, we did not find an associated effect of career-committee congruence on legislative success for former state legislators. New MCs in general, then, still face significant barriers to seeing their bills become law.

Finally, we test expectations for congruence and political ambition by considering its effect on committee chairmanships and making a successful move to the U.S. Senate. Table 6 provides the results for the probit regression models. Although we see a negative relationship with congruence and an eventual move to the Senate, it does not reach statistical significance (p value = .141). The results in Table 6 also indicate that new MCs with congruence are more likely to become a subcommittee chair than the new MCs without the same early connection, although the relationship is weaker than we anticipated (p value = .095).²³ This relationship does not extend to the more prestigious and less abundant committee chairmanships. In this way, we see some potential for members with career-committee congruence to translate early legislative activities into continued policy leadership later in their career, but continued research is needed.²⁴

Table 6.

The Influence of Career-Committee Congruence on Political Ambition.

	Move to senate			Subcommittee chair			Full committee chair
	Coefficient	SE	p value	Coefficient	SE	p value	Coefficient	SE	p value
Any career-committee congruence	−0.204	0.138	.141	0.146	0.088	.095	0.064	0.131	.638
In majority party	0.131	0.125	.295	0.050	0.079	.527	−0.159	0.110	.151
Vote share	−0.003	0.005	.527	0.009	0.003	.007	0.014	0.005	.002
Freshman	−0.101	0.050	.044	−0.121	0.036	.001	0.016	0.054	.765
White	0.546	0.306	.074	0.282	0.143	.049	0.302	0.224	.179
Woman	−0.156	0.200	.439	−0.045	0.126	.719	−0.188	0.191	.326
Former state legislator	0.092	0.135	.493	0.048	0.089	.588	−0.263	0.139	.057
Former congressional staff	−0.029	0.215	.892	−0.067	0.137	.626	0.277	0.183	.131
Ideological position	−0.594	0.326	.068	−0.413	0.213	.052	−0.443	0.344	.198
Constant	−1.708	0.469	.000	−0.922	0.298	.002	−2.382	0.458	.000

Note. n = 908. Results are estimated with probit regressions, with clustered standard errors given that MCs may be in the dataset twice, for their first and second term. The bold-faced values represent p value <.10.

In conclusion, our analysis supports our hypotheses. New MCs with prior career experience that easily fit into the organization of the House committee system are more likely to be assigned to a career-associated committee. MCs with career-committee congruence are more likely to introduce legislation on associated topics (that often goes through their committee of service) and perhaps become subcommittee chairs. In all, career-committee congruence can help members transition quickly into the legislative work of the House.

Discussion and Conclusion

In the committee assignment process, not all MCs fare the same. As we have discussed throughout this article, there are advantages and consequences to being a new MC assigned to a committee that is congruent with his or her past career experiences. These results are evident over different dimensions of legislative behavior for MCs with or without previous legislative experience: the topics of bills that new MCs introduce and the overtime impact of that expertise and success on members’ ambition for committee leadership.

First, we show that career-committee congruence is a real, purposeful phenomenon with past, related career experience predicting assignment to the relevant committee for about three quarters of career-committee pairs examined. We acknowledge, of course, that not every past experience will be as relatable for work in the House as others. Second, career-committee congruence is associated with higher levels of policy-specific activity and subcommittee leadership positions. In addition, the effects for bill introductions are enhanced for those with prior legislative experience at the state level. In other words, matching new MCs to committees for which their past careers have prepared translates into potential legislative results in terms of legislation introduced. Career-committee congruence encourages new MCs to introduce legislation that builds on their past experience and applies those insights to public policy outcomes.

However, congruence does not seem to help new members overcome the significant barriers to getting their legislation passed. We find this to be the case for those with previous state legislative experience and for those without it. Although counter to our expectations, legislative obstacles may be great for new members, especially during an era with significant gridlock where even experienced legislators face increased lawmaking difficulties.

To be clear, our analysis draws these conclusions about a key, but limited, period in the congressional career. Of course, we may find a different pattern of results if we expanded our focus to the rest of MCs’ careers. This may be especially true for congruence and its future leadership position effects. Our dataset is naturally incomplete, with many new members’ legislative careers still unfolding. This is an area that is fruitful for future observation and analysis. In sum, career-committee congruence is by no means deterministic; new MCs can and do shift their legislative attention and priorities over time. What we have found, though, is that in the early terms, serving on a committee informed by past career experience can provide new MCs with a type of legislative subsidy, amenable to increased legislative participation (Hall, 1996; Hall & Deardorff, 2006).

Why does this matter? For one, we argue that it speaks to current concerns about the identity and background of representatives and the diversity of the legislature. Electing a career-diverse Congress helps to ensure that a wide range of lived experience and expertise is brought to bear on the policies that Congress considers. For another, we have provided evidence that points to a potential strategy for encouraging the quality of legislation that Congress produces: assign new members to committees that connect to their career backgrounds. This may be particularly helpful for new MCs, who often lack the legislative leverage of their more senior colleagues. Of course, not every member may desire this (MCs represent diverse districts), but our analysis does clarify the potential impact of taking this step.

Finally, when new MCs introduce bills on areas of personal expertise, and when these bills become law, MCs are acting in the stead of—that is, representing—their constituents. One on-going concern with this formulation is how to hold elected officials accountable to their constituents, all of whom may not be overly aware of or engaged in politics. Our research suggests a mechanism for buttressing congressional representation and accountability—Elect MCs from diverse career backgrounds and put them on career-relevant committees. When new MCs, aided by their committee assignments, act out of their areas of expertise, they have ample resources for working on the concerns, interests, ideas, and solutions of their voters. Pairing career experiences and committee assignments, thus, benefits not only individual MCs but also the voters on whose behalf they serve in office.

Footnotes

Appendix

Table A3.

Full Regression Results for Impact of Career-Committee Congruence on Number of Policy Relevant Bills Introduced by MCs.

	Coefficient	SE	p value
Agriculture bills
Farming, ranching experience	0.361	0.180	.045
% rural	0.006	0.001	.000
First term	−0.062	0.023	.033
In majority	0.024	0.037	.448
Partial term	−0.020	0.048	.673
Total number of bills introduced	0.015	0.003	.000
Vote share	−0.001	0.001	.592
White	−0.021	0.043	.623
Woman	0.020	0.049	.680
Education level	0.005	0.027	.839
Former state legislator	−0.024	0.039	.532
Congressional staff	0.151	0.082	.069
Ideological position	0.019	0.075	.802
Constant	0.016	0.178	.930
n	810
Defense bills
Military experience	0.309	0.111	.033
% veterans	−0.009	0.011	.465
First term	0.033	0.070	.637
In majority	−0.037	0.071	.601
Partial term	0.173	0.119	.147
Total number of bills introduced	0.078	0.008	.000
Vote share	−0.009	0.003	.001
White	−0.071	0.106	.503
Woman	0.252	0.105	.017
Education level	0.033	0.059	.564
Former state legislator	0.042	0.069	.538
Congressional staff	0.062	0.133	.643
Ideological position	0.300	0.093	.001
Constant	0.433	0.449	.335
n	729
Banking bills
Financial experience	0.508	0.209	.015
% white-collar jobs	0.008	0.007	.280
First term	0.000	0.000	.362
First term	0.043	0.074	.562
In majority	0.049	0.061	.423
Partial term	0.133	0.129	.305
Total number of bills introduced	0.078	0.011	.000
Vote share	0.003	0.004	.553
White	−0.198	0.125	.143
Woman	0.034	0.094	.715
Education level	0.007	0.045	.881
Former state legislator	−0.019	0.070	.783
Congressional staff	−0.117	0.095	.216
Ideological position	0.205	0.121	.090
Constant	−0.814	0.578	.159
n	738
Macroeconomic bills
Financial experience	0.393	0.127	.098
% white-collar jobs	−0.010	0.006	.069
District median income	0.000	0.000	.004
First term	−0.030	0.049	.572
In majority	−0.040	0.048	.470
Partial term	−0.019	0.064	.767
Total number of bills introduced	0.034	0.006	.000
Vote share	0.004	0.003	.157
White	0.172	0.074	.021
Woman	−0.173	0.058	.003
Education level	0.023	0.031	.454
Former state legislator	−0.030	0.047	.527
Congressional staff	0.057	0.089	.523
Ideological position	−0.189	0.093	.043
Constant	−0.128	0.332	.699
n	738
Education bills
Education—college	1.035	0.410	.012
Median district income	0.000	0.000	.084
First term	0.044	0.043	.307
In majority	−0.135	0.055	.014
Partial term	0.060	0.104	.561
Total number of bills introduced	0.044	0.005	.000
Vote share	−0.002	0.002	.364
White	−0.294	0.108	.007
Woman	0.160	0.085	.059
Education level	−0.029	0.046	.524
Former state legislator	−0.064	0.057	.266
Congressional staff	−0.040	0.103	.697
Ideological position	0.124	0.103	.220
Constant	0.455	0.306	.138
n	810
Defense bills
Military experience	0.408	0.173	.018
% veterans	−0.007	0.012	.550
First term	0.036	0.070	.607
In majority	−0.033	0.071	.634
Partial term	0.166	0.112	.164
Total number of bills introduced	0.078	0.008	.000
Vote share	−0.009	0.003	.001
White	−0.071	0.107	.507
Woman	0.246	0.105	.020
Education level	0.036	0.059	.542
Former state legislator	0.039	0.069	.578
Congressional staff	0.059	0.093	.001
Ideological position	0.324	0.093	.001
Constant	0.431	0.448	.336
n	729
Law, crime, and family bills
Legal experience	0.734	0.215	.001
Median district income	0.000	0.000	.916
First term	0.051	0.050	.310
In majority	−0.114	0.072	.115
Partial term	−0.175	0.061	.004
Total number of bills introduced	0.048	0.007	.000
Vote share	0.005	0.003	.059
White	0.015	0.120	.898
Woman	0.057	0.087	.511
Education level	−0.021	0.045	.640
Former state legislator	−0.060	0.065	.355
Congressional staff	−0.169	0.086	.049
Ideological position	−0.270	0.108	.013
Constant	−0.106	0.358	.767
n	810
Law, crime, and family bills
Law enforcement experience	1.590	0.093	.000
District median income	0.000	0.000	.490
First term	0.051	0.050	.308
In majority	−0.112	0.073	.127
Partial term	−0.182	0.059	.002
Total number of bills introduced	0.049	0.007	.036
Vote share	0.006	0.003	.036
White	0.025	0.122	.840
Woman	0.031	0.087	.720
Education level	0.032	0.046	.487
Former state legislator	−0.058	0.066	.382
Congressional staff	−0.171	0.090	.057
Ideological position	−0.335	0.106	.002
Constant	−0.288	0.362	.426
n	810
Banking bills
Small business experience	0.214	0.111	.055
% white-collar jobs	0.009	0.007	.216
Median district income	0.000	0.000	.343
First term	0.037	0.075	.624
In majority	0.044	0.061	.473
Partial term	0.142	0.129	.271
Total number of bills introduced	0.078	0.011	.000
Vote share	0.003	0.004	.568
White	−0.194	0.134	.148
Woman	0.022	0.094	.806
Education level	0.017	0.046	.715
Former state legislator	−0.017	0.071	.807
Congressional staff	−0.111	0.093	.235
Ideological position	0.211	0.120	.077
Constant	−0.932	0.579	.107
n	738
Macroeconomic bills
Small business experience	0.058	0.080	.471
% white-collar jobs	−0.009	0.006	.090
Median district income	0.000	0.000	.003
First term	−0.030	0.049	.538
In majority	−0.038	0.049	.434
Partial term	−0.018	0.650	.784
Total number of bills introduced	0.034	0.006	.000
Vote share	0.004	0.003	.176
White	0.174	0.074	.019
Woman	−0.182	0.058	.002
Education level	0.023	0.031	.391
Former state legislator	−0.031	0.015	.512
Congressional staff	0.062	0.089	.490
Ideological position	−0.186	0.094	.047
Constant	−0.173	0.338	.610
n	738
Science, space, technology, and communication Bills
Education experience—college	0.246	0.158	.119
% white-collar jobs	0.001	0.002	.618
Median district income	0.000	0.000	.047
First term	−0.079	0.022	.000
In majority	0.037	0.023	.115
Partial term	−0.029	0.027	.279
Total number of bills introduced	0.007	0.002	.000
Vote share	0.001	0.001	.544
White	−0.003	0.045	.958
Woman	0.043	0.039	.272
Education level	−0.008	0.020	.696
Former state legislator	−0.024	0.025	.327
Congressional staff	0.056	0.047	.236
Ideological position	0.053	0.043	.223
Constant	−0.174	0.166	.296
n	738
Health bills
Medical experience	2.200	0.731	.003
% white-collar jobs	0.015	0.008	.071
Median district income	0.000	0.000	.046
First term	−0.239	0.065	.000
In majority	−0.100	0.075	.199
Partial term	−0.087	0.081	.282
Total number of bills introduced	0.078	0.009	.000
Vote share	−0.001	0.003	.686
White	0.297	0.129	.021
Woman	0.552	0.126	.000
Education level	0.111	0.061	.071
Former state legislator	0.030	0.080	.713
Congressional staff	0.011	0.130	.933
Ideological position	0.090	0.145	.532
Constant	−0.801	0.601	.183
n	738
Community development and housing bills
Military experience	0.016	0.106	.884
% veterans	0.005	0.006	.415
First term	0.017	0.034	.631
In majority	0.029	0.036	.420
Partial term	−0.007	0.050	.883
Total number of bills introduced	0.025	0.004	.000
Vote share	0.000	0.002	.777
White	−0.149	0.060	.014
Woman	−0.005	0.048	.924
Education level	0.011	0.028	.671
Former state legislator	−0.035	0.039	.369
Congressional staff	−0.109	0.043	.012
Ideological position	0.080	0.079	.308
Constant	−0.038	0.200	.850
n	729

Note. The table contains separate probit regression analyses for each committee, with clustered standard errors given that MCs may be in the dataset twice, for their first and second term. The ns differ by regression because some district demographic variables are not available in the Almanac of American Politics for all the Congresses in our dataset. The bold-faced values represent p value <.10. MCs = members of Congress.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biographies

Katherine Francis studies American politics, particularly legislative behavior and Congress. She received her PhD from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and now teaches at Western Governors University.

Brittany Bramlett studies American politics, focusing in political behavior, religion, and congressional behavior. She has a PhD in political science from the University of Maryland and currently teaches at the University of Georgia.

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