Which best characterizes the use of oversight powers in Congress in recent years Quizlet

THE GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF CONGRESSIONAL OVERSIGHT

What is the Basis for Congressional Oversight?

Congressional oversight is one of the most important responsibilities of the United States Congress. Congressional oversight refers to the review, monitoring, and supervision of federal agencies, programs and policy implementation, and it provides the legislative branch with an opportunity to inspect, examine, review and check the executive branch and its agencies. The authority of Congress to do oversight is derived from its implied powers in the U.S. Constitution, various laws, and House rules. In affirming Congress' oversight powers, the Supreme Court in McGrain v. Daugherty stated that "the power of inquiry � with process to enforce it � is an essential and appropriate auxiliary to the legislative function." In Watkins v. United States the Court described Congress' oversight power by stating that the "power of the Congress to conduct investigations is inherent in the legislative process. That power is broad." The Supreme Court also observed that "a legislative body cannot legislate wisely or effectively in the absence of information respecting the conditions which the legislation is intended to affect or change." The Legislative Reorganization Act of 1946 mandated that House and Senate committees exercise "continuous watchfulness" of the administration of laws and programs under their jurisdiction. The Legislative Reorganization Act of 1970 permitted House standing committees to "review and study, on a continuing basis, the application, administration and execution of laws" under its jurisdiction.

Why Does Congress Need to Do Oversight?

• Ensure executive compliance with legislative intent.
• Improve the efficiency, effectiveness, and economy of governmental operations.
• Evaluate program performance.
• Prevent executive encroachment on legislative prerogatives and powers.
• Investigate alleged instances of poor administration, arbitrary and capricious behavior, abuse, waste, dishonesty, and fraud.
• Assess an agency or official's ability to manage and carry out program objectives.
• Review and determine federal financial priorities.
• Ensure that executive policies reflect the public interest.
• Protect individual rights and liberties.
• Review agency rule-making processes.
• Acquire information useful in future policymaking.

What Do the Rules of the House Require of Committees With Respect to Oversight?

Clause 2(b)(1) of Rule X - Each standing committee, except Appropriations, shall review and study on a continuing basis the application, administration, and execution of all laws within its legislative jurisdiction.

Clause 2(d) of Rule X - Each standing committee is to submit its oversight plans for the duration of a Congress by February 15 of the first session to the Committees on Government Reform and House Administration. Not later than March 31, the Committee on Government Reform must report an oversight agenda.

Clauses 2(b)(2) and 5(d) of Rule X - Each standing Committee is authorized to require its subcommittees to conduct oversight in their jurisdictional areas or to create an oversight subcommittee.

Clause 1(d)(1) of Rule XI - Each committee must submit to the House, not later than January 2 of each odd-numbered year, a report on the activities of that committee for the Congress.

Clause 1(d)(2) of Rule XI - The survey of activities report must include separate sections summarizing the legislative and oversight activities of that committee during that Congress.

Clause 1(d)(3) of Rule XI - The oversight section of the survey of activities report must include a summary of the oversight plans submitted by the committee at the beginning of the Congress, a summary of the actions taken, recommendations made with respect to each such plan, and a summary of any additional oversight activities undertaken by that committee.

Clause 3(c) of Rule XIII - Committee reports on measures must include oversight findings separately set out and clearly identified.

****For further reference see "Congressional Oversight - A How to Series of Workshops", 106th Congress Rules Committee Print, June 28, July 12, and 26, 1999; "Congressional Oversight" by Frederick M. Kaiser (CRS), updated February 16, 1999 and the "Congressional Oversight Manual" (CRS), updated June 25, 1999.

How did the contentious presidential election of 1876 lead to the official end of Reconstruction?

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How did white southerners seek to reverse African-American political and social gains during and after the era of Reconstruction?

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The __________ Supreme Court decision ruled that legal segregation on the basis of race did not run contrary to the 14th Amendment and affirmed southern laws segregating public facilities and schools.

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What was the primary significance of Congress' efforts to impeach President Andrew Johnson in 1868?

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What was the primary significance of the 14th Amendment, which the Radical Republicans in Congress passed in 1866?

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Which of the following is an argument that African-American leaders made as to why voting rights were essential for African-Americans in the postwar South?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the structure of local and state governments in the South during Reconstruction?

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Why did white southerners pass "black codes" following the Civil War?

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What was the primary difference between Presidential and Congressional Reconstruction?

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Corporate officials used which of the following practices to increase worker efficiency during the late-19th and early-20th centuries?

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Which of the following "pull" factors led to increased immigration from Europe and Asia to the United States in the second half of the 19th century?

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Which of the following factors account for the expansion of the labor movement in the United States during the second half of the 19th century?

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Which of the following factors led to a significant migration of African-Americans to northern cities in the first two decades of the 20th century?

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Which of the following problems did poor urban residents encounter in American cities during the 19th and early-20th centuries?

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Which of the following statements BEST characterizes that federal government's relationship with American corporations during the late-19th century?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the U.S. government's response to European and Asian immigration in the late-19th and early-20th centuries?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the transformation of American cities over the course of the 19th century?

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Which of the following was a MAJOR difference between the Knights of Labor and the American Federation of Labor?

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The growth of industry in the United States following the Civil War was BEST characterized by which of the following processes?

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Fill in the blanks. American treatment of Filipino rebels during the three-year war for control of the Philippine Islands may BEST be described as _______________ and _________________.

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How did President William Howard Taft’s diplomatic policies differ from President Theodore Roosevelt's policies?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the American public's reaction to the outcome of the Spanish-American War?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes Theodore Roosevelt's policies regarding America's diplomatic relationships with countries in Central and South America?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the key differences between the economic and social development of the East and the economic and social development of the American West in the 19th century?

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Which of the following statements BEST explains why American political leaders intervened militarily in Cuba in 1898?

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Which of these statements BEST describes the impact of transcontinental railroad lines on western development in the 19th century?

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Which statement BEST describes how federal policy towards Native Americans in the West changed during the course of the late 19th century after the Civil War?

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Which of these statements BEST describes the role that the federal government played in encouraging westward migration during and after the Civil War?

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What aspects of President Theodore Roosevelt’s public life does this cartoon reference?

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What was the primary objective of Progressive reformers engaged in the City Beautiful movement?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the national impact of the Populist movement?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the beliefs of Progressive reformers in the United States at the turn of the 20th century?

Choose one answer.

	a. Progressives believed that local, state, and national governments should play no role in regulating business activities, addressing social problems, or advancing American democracy.
	b. Progressives believed that local, state, and national governments should address social problems but should not regulate business activities in any manner.
	c. Progressives believed that local and state governments should regulate businesses and correct social problems but that the national government should not deal with these subjects.
	d. Progressives believed that local, state, and national governments should regulate businesses, correct social problems, and advance American democracy.
	e. Progressives believed that the national government should regulate businesses and address social problems but that local and state governments should not engage in reforms.

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the roles played by women and African Americans in Progressive-Era reform campaigns?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the major difference between the Populist and the Progressive reform movements in the United States?

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Which of the following was NOT a way that Progressive reformers sought to correct problems in America's cities?

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Why did the Populist Party support coining silver and thereby increasing the supply of money in circulation throughout the United States?

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Which of the following factors contributed to the emergence of the Populist political movement in the Midwest and South during the 1890s?

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How did the Republican presidential administrations of the 1920s differ from the Progressive presidential administrations of the first two decades of the 20th century?

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The ___________ were laws in 1917 and 1918 that criminalized antiwar protest activities and the federal government also used the laws against radical political organizations in the United States.

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What motivated President Woodrow Wilson to ask Congress to declare war on Germany and its allies in the spring of 1917?

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Which of the following factors contributed to the "Red Scare" of 1920?

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Which of the following statements BEST characterizes President Woodrow Wilson's actions during the Versailles Treaty negotiations?

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Which of the following statements BEST characterizes the position of women in American society during the 1920s?

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Which of the following was a direct consequence of African American migration from the rural South to the urban North during the 1910s and 1920s?

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Which of the following was NOT a consequence of the growing popularity of automobiles in the United States during the 1920s?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes America's involvement in World War I prior to 1917?

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How did the United States government's treatment of Japanese-American citizens differ from its treatment of citizens of German and Italian ancestry during World War II?

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How did the United States' economic and political status in the international community change as a result of World War II?

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How did World War II affect African Americans in the United States?

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The ____________ was a law enacted in 1935 which among its provisions provided assistance to dependent children who did not have a wage-earning parent.

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Which of the following statements BEST characterize President Herbert Hoover's response to the Great Depression in the United States?

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Which of the following statements BEST characterizes the differences between the First and Second New Deals?

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Which of the following statements BEST characterizes the legacy of the New Deal?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes Franklin D. Roosevelt’s reform proposals during his 1932 presidential campaign?

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All of the following factors directly contributed to the Great Depression in the United States EXCEPT:

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How did President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Congress respond to the Soviet Union's launch of Sputnik in October of 1957?

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What was the United States' policy on the use of nuclear weapons during the early years of the Cold War?

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Which of the following communication technology devices had the greatest impact on American society in the 1950s?

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Which of the following is an important lesson that United States policy makers learned from the Korean War?

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Which of the following statements BEST characterizes American society during the 1950s?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the dominant cultural attitudes towards women in the United States during the 1950s?

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Which of the following statements BEST explains George Kennan's post-World War II policy of Containment?

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Which of the following statements BEST explains the origins of the Red Scare in the 1950s?

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How did the United States' post-World War II policies compare to the postwar policies of the Soviet Union?

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A series of “sit-ins” as civil rights protests in 1960 resulted in the formation of the _____.

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How did Malcolm X's message of Black Nationalism differ from Martin Luther King, Jr.'s nonviolent, integrationist approach to civil rights?

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What was the significance of the 1955 Montgomery Bus Boycott?

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What was the significance of the 1965 Voting Rights Act?

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Which of the following factors contributed to the rebirth of the Feminist movement in the 1960s?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the gay and lesbian liberation movement in the 1960s and early 1970s?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the reaction of white Americans to the civil rights movement by the end of the 1960s?

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Why did Martin Luther King, Jr. select Birmingham, Alabama, as the site for major civil rights protests in the spring of 1963?

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What was the significance of the U.S. Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education ruling in 1954?

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How did President John F. Kennedy respond to the growing Communist guerilla war in South Vietnam?

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Which of the following challenges did U.S. military forces face in South Vietnam?

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Which of the following domestic concerns did President Gerald Ford attempt to tackle during his one term as president?

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Which of the following is NOT characteristic of the Counterculture?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes President Lyndon B. Johnson's response to the deteriorating political and military situation in South Vietnam in 1964?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the political and military situation that President Lyndon B. Johnson faced in South Vietnam at the beginning of his presidency?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the origins of the Anti-War Movement during the Vietnam Era?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the impact of the Watergate Scandal on Richard M. Nixon's presidency?

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Which of the following was a consequence of the Vietnam War for the United States?

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How did President John F. Kennedy and his administration respond to the discovery of Soviet nuclear missiles in Communist Cuba in the fall of 1962?

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How did Mikhail Gorbachev's political policies in the Soviet Union lessen tensions between Russia and the United States?

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How did President Ronald Reagan's policies towards the Soviet Union differ from President Jimmy Carter's policies?

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Which of the following factors led to a resurgence of political conservatism in the United States during the 1970s and early 1980s?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes President Ronald Reagan's economic policies during his first term in office?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the failures of the Carter Administration?

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Which of the following statements BEST describes the economic legacy of Ronald Reagan's two terms in office?

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Which of the following was a significant foreign policy accomplishment of the Carter administration?

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George W. Bush's presidential campaign focused on which of the following issues?

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How did President Bill Clinton's first term in office differ from his second term in office?

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How did President Bill Clinton's political values differ from previous 20th-century Democratic presidents?

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How did President George W. Bush and the U.S. government respond to the September 11th attacks in New York City and Washington, D.C.?

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In which of the following ways did the U.S. economy change during the 1990s?

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What was the major source of controversy in the presidential election of 2000?

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Which of the following factors played a causal role in the "Great Recession" of 2008?

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Which of the following foreign policy matters did President Bill Clinton deal with during his time in office?

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Which of the following was a challenge that Democrat President Barack Obama faced after being elected president in 2008?

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How did George H.W. Bush's presidential policies depart from his predecessor Ronald Reagan's policies?

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Which of the following best describes recent trends in the use of the congressional oversight power?

Which statement best explains the oversight function of congressional committees quizlet?

What is congressional oversight and how strongly is it pursued by Congress quizlet?

Which statement about Congress oversight capacity is accurate?