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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
The authors suggest that committees use nonlegislative hearings, or oversight hearings, as a means of expanding their own jurisdictions. Because nonlegislative hearings afford committees considerable flexibility, they use these hearings in the hope of redefining an issue. Using nonlegislative hearings, committees will attempt to convince others that a given issue has multiple dimensions and that they have some claim to a component of the issue. The authors find that nonlegislative hearings have a significant influence on the evolution of committee jurisdictions over time.
NONLEGISLATIVE HEARINGS AND POLICY CHANGE
When Senator Edward Kennedy assumed the chair of the Administrative Practices and Procedure Subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee in 1969, he inherited a weak unit with little legislative clout or public visibility. Within five years he changed the direction of federal policy in a dramatic way, however, even without expanding the legislative mandate of his subcommittee. While the “Ad Prac” subcommittee had statutory jurisdiction over only a limited number of topics, it had an extremely broad mandate for administrative oversight and investigation. With virtually the entire federal bureaucracy open to his investigation, Kennedy searched for areas where he could make a mark. After a few years of issue-jumping, he enlisted the assistance of Harvard Law Professor Stephen Breyer in 1974 to help the subcommittee focus on a specific issue area. After a year of planning and research, the Ad Prac Subcommittee held oversight hearings on deregulation of the airline industry. The resulting attention to the idea eventually forced Congress to act.
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