1	Woodrow Wilson Congressional Government (1885) Background During the 1880s Congress was beginning to emerge from an institution "citizen legislators" dominated to a venue in which professional politicians advanced their political careers. Member reelection and internal power incentives began to shape Congress and led directly to the rise of multiple committees to serve these incentives. Committees were the "little legislatures" that collectively defined Congress.
2	Wilson's Dismay The more the young Wilson studied Congress the more dismayed he became. Committee denomination of Congress reflected a decentralization and fragmentation of the legislative process that advanced special interests and defeated the collective will of popular majorities that parties should represent
3	Call For Party Government The conclusion of Congressional Government calls for more party control of Congress to connect it to public opinion. But, as Wilson observed, committees define congressional politics, not disciplined parties. Capitol Hill politics then and now reflects an ebb and flow and committee and party control, but the cycles of committee power are longer than those of party dominance.
4	Wilson on Congress Congress is hard to see satisfactorily and appreciatively at a single view and from a single stand-point. Its complicated forms and diversified structure confuse the vision, and conceal the system which underlies its composition. It is too complex to be understood without an effort, without a careful and systematic process of analysis. Consequently, very few people do understand it, and its doors are practically shut against the comprehension of the public at large.
5	Public Cannot Assess Legislative Responsibility There is no great minister or ministry to represent the will and being of Congress in the common thought. The Speaker of the House of Representatives stands as near to leadership as any one; but his will does not run as a formative and imperative power in legislation much beyond the appointment of the committees
6	Chairmen of Standing Committees are the Leaders of Congress The leaders of the House are the chairmen of the principal Standing Committees. Indeed, to be exactly accurate, the House has as many leaders as there are subjects of legislation;
7	Standing Committees the Little Legislatures of the House There are as many Standing Committees as there are leading classes of legislation, and in the consideration of every topic of business the House is guided by a special leader in the person of the chairman of the Standing Committee, charged with the superintendence of measures of the particular class to which that topic belongs.
8	Decentralization of Power The privileges of the Standing Committees are the beginning and the end of the rules. Both the House of Representatives and the Senate conduct their business by what may figuratively, but not inaccurately, be called an odd device of disintegration. The House virtually both deliberates and legislates in small sections.
9	Congress at Work Is In Its Committee Rooms The House sits, not for serious discussion, but to sanction the conclusions of its Committees as rapidly as possible. It legislates in its committee-rooms; not by the determinations of majorities, but by the resolutions of specially-commissioned minorities; so that it is not far from the truth to say that Congress in session is Congress on public exhibition, whilst Congress in its committee-rooms is Congress at work