The 35 Least-effective Members Of Congress

According to a July Gallup poll, public approval of Congress has fallen to near-record lows. On average, 34% of the population approves of a given Congress. The current 114th Congress has a 17% approval rating.

Americans have reason to be concerned. According to GovTrack.us, the last two Congresses have enacted fewer laws than any other Congress since 1947. And the 114th Congress may just surpass them all in terms of doing nothing.

House Speaker John Boehner has argued that “We ought to be judged on how many laws we repeal"—not by the laws they pass. Even by that metric, Boehner’s Congress is still underperforming as a law must be passed to repeal another one.

While Congress has been inefficient across the board, some members have been exceptionally unexceptional. Using data from GovTrack, InsideGov created an Effectiveness Score to determine the least-effective members of Congress.

The effectiveness score is the percentage of bills sponsored by each congressperson over their time in office that went on to pass committee. The score does not factor in the percentage of bills that turned into law because such a small number of proposed bills and resolutions actually become laws.

While it’s true that some congresspeople intentionally make an effort to stymie fast-tracked legislation, the members on this list are sponsoring their own legislation and not getting it passed through committee.

This list only includes members of Congress who have served at least one full term and does not include bills introduced in the 114th Congress, since they still have time to get passed.

These are the 35 least-effective members of Congress. See if your representatives make the list:

the last two Congresses have enacted fewer laws than any other Congress since 1947.

Oh gee, I wonder why?

Could it have been a Speaker who refused to bring any bills to the table to be at least debated on? It's amazing where so few bills were made into law when you had somebody obstructing the bills and then accuse the other side of being obstructionists....

That goes both ways, obviously. If I knew a given speaker was likely to shelve bills, I'd push through a train of terrible bills for him to shelve so I could claim he shelved all my bills.

Which did what again?

When they lost the majority in the Senate, those "terrible" bills were still passed (and then vetoed).

You should realize that he didn't want the president or any liberal/democrats on the hook for voting nay/vetoing any bills that would have helped this country.

Now it doesn't matter if Obama's on the hook for vetoing jobs bills or appropriations bills, he isn't going to be elected again.

The effectiveness score is the percentage of bills sponsored by each congressperson over their time in office that went on to pass committee. The score does not factor in the percentage of bills that turned into law because such a small number of proposed bills and resolutions actually become laws.

Wouldn't necessarily say that's the best metric to determine effectiveness, but hey.

Again, you just boil every political topic down to "us good, them bad". There's a lot more dynamic to governance than party competition. People put riders on bills to make them unappealing, bills are voted on a disapproval to shift votes around and create material for campaign ads, people introduce bills in crunch situations knowing they'll be shelved for time so they can claim they were shelved for content, etc.

There's basically nothing in life, and especially in politics, that's as simple as you want it to be.

24 Democrats, 10 Republicans, and 1 Independent. It's not like Chanti to post something that makes the Democrats look worse than the Republicans.

So, are you saying that Reid did not shelve bills because he didn't like the topic? Or that he did for reasons other than preventing said liberal/democrats and the president responsible for voting/signing said bills?

Would you like to give examples, or are you just going to talk out of a specific orifice (your pick) like you usually do?

I'm not saying he did or didn't shelve them for content, only he really knows that for a fact. What I'm saying is that you are discounting all the reasons why bills either don't make it onto the floor or never get passed except the one reason that fits into your nice little "good vs bad" box. And, since we're being specific, I pointed out a few of the things that convolute the process like voting to disapprove, riders, and introducing bills late strategically. But, since you can't seem to discuss anything without resorting to that tone, I'm not discussing it further.

I just assumed everyone was tied for 541st place.

It takes a lot to get me to like posts by both Jet and Vic on the same page. Amazing work, Skjalf.

All or nearly all members of the Congress and the House of Representatives are criminals.

The House is part of Congress...

Hmm, on the list we've got 24 Democrats, 10 Republicans, and 1 Independent. It's not like Chanti to post something that makes the Democrats look worse than the Republicans.

The Democrats are dumb, the Republicans are stupid. The difference is dumb isn't funny. Stupid is seriously funny.

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Could it have been a Speaker who refused to bring any bills to the table to be at least debated on?...

This isn't about bills shelved by the speaker. Its about an inability to move bills out of committees.