Congress and Its Members

Roger H. Davidson was professor emeritus of government and politics at the University of Maryland and served as visiting professor of political science at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He was a senior fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration. During the 1970s, he served on the staffs of reform efforts in both the House (Bolling-Martin Committee) and the Senate (Stevenson-Brock Committee). For the 2001–2002 academic year, he served as the John Marshall chair in political science at the University of Debrecen, Hungary. His books include Remaking Congress: Change and Stability in the 1990s, co-edited with James A. Thurber (1995), and Understanding the Presidency, 7th ed., co-edited with James P. Pfiffner (2013). Davidson was co-editor with Donald C. Bacon and Morton Keller of The Encyclopedia of the United States Congress (1995).

Walter J. Oleszek is a senior specialist in the legislative process at the Congressional Research Service. He has served as either a full-time professional staff aide or consultant to many major House and Senate congressional reorganization efforts beginning with the passage of the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1970. In 1993, he served as policy director of the Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress. A former adjunct faculty member at American University, Oleszek is a frequent lecturer to various academic, governmental, and business groups. He is the author or co-author of several books, including Congressional Procedures and the Policy Process, 11th ed. (2020), and Congress Under Fire: Reform Politics and the Republican Majority, with C. Lawrence Evans (1997).

Frances E. Lee is professor of politics and public affairs in the School of Public and International Affairs and the Department of Politics at Princeton University. She has been a research fellow at the Brookings Institution and an APSA congressional fellow. Most recently, she is co-author of The Limits of Party: Congress and Lawmaking in a Polarized Era (2020). She is also the author of Insecure Majorities: Congress and the Perpetual Campaign (2016) and Beyond Ideology: Politics, Principles, and Partisanship in the U.S. Senate (2009) and co-author, with Bruce I. Oppenheimer, of Sizing Up the Senate: The Unequal Consequences of Equal Representation (1999). Her articles have appeared in the American Political Science Review, Journal of Politics, Legislative Studies Quarterly, and American Journal of Political Science, among others.