Sub-Committees of Congress1

Much has been written of the mechanics of legislation in the Senate and the House of Representatives, and of the work performed by the committees of the Senate and the House. Little attention, however, has been paid to the sub-committees of Congress notwithstanding the fact that sub-committees perform a highly important function in legislation.The Senate and the House are both such large bodies that it is imperative that the work of the bodies be handled initially through numerous committees. In the Senate there are seventy-four standing committees. In the House there are fifty-eight. The very reasons that make it advisable that committees be appointed at all in the Senate and in the House, make it desirable in certain cases that the work of the committees be even further sub-divided as occasion may warrant. When the work assigned to a standing committee of Senate or House is of a definite character that admits of practically no division, or when the committee itself of either body is small and appointed to have immediate consideration of a particular subject, the ordinary procedure is for the full committee to handle its work, without attempting to call upon members of the committee to act as a sub-committee, with the exception of sub-committee work in performance of a perfunctory duty, or, in the preparation, for instance, of a report where one member can prepare it far more expeditiously than could three members, five members, or the full committee.