How to Restore the Founding Fathers’ Vision for Congress

231 years ago, this week, delegates to the Constitutional Convention signed the U.S. Constitution, and each year on September 17 we commemorate its creation and signing. Our founding fathers designed this document to be a national framework for our government, serving as a guideline for balancing governmental powers and ensuring our governmental system functions properly to perform its responsibilities to the American people.  

But today our legislative branch isn’t living up to its potential to govern due to political gridlock. Our founding fathers envisioned a system of vigorous debate and disagreement, but also one of collaboration and consensus-building.  Yet, the last three Congresses have been the least productive in terms of passing legislation, and Congress has failed to pass a budget on time for the last four decades. There have been recent signals of change—including the creation of the Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process Reform and progress on appropriations bills for fiscal year 2019—but larger institutional changes must be made to revitalize our government and restore the founding fathers’ vision for, and Americans’ faith in, Congress.  

As the start of the 116th Congress nears, there’s a perfect opportunity for this new Congress to renew the promise of our legislative branch. That’s why we, and 67 members of Congress, are advocating for a Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress. This new committee, made up of an equal number from each party and chamber, would study the functions of Congress and propose recommendations to make the institution more efficient, effective, and accountable to the American people. It would also ensure more work is getting done by improving the movement of legislation and restoring the relationships between the houses of Congress, the branches of government, and members and their constituents.  

By implementing a Joint Committee on the Organization of Congress, we can restore the type of representative democracy our founding fathers envisioned. Here’s what a renewed Congress committed to the American people and prepared to address tomorrow’s challenges would do: 

1. Enable bipartisan cooperation and consensus-building to achieve legislative results 

2. Empower congressional committees which are key to bipartisan bridge-building 

3. Ensure robust amendment processes 

4. Pass budgets and complete funding bills on time 

5. Provide effective and regular oversight of federal programs 

Click here to ask your representative to make vital changes needed to bring Congress together and propel our nation forward.