Writing Homework Help

Some
of the more prominent decision-makers in the policy process are members
of Congress since they play the central role in the passage of
legislation. The decisions, though, are not made in a vacuum. There are
several factors that influence policymakers’ decisions: values, party
affiliation, constituency interests, public opinion, deference, and
decision rules. When a member of Congress votes yes or no on a given
bill, it may be due to his or her personal values or it may be based on
his or her deference to other members of Congress with more experience
and knowledge in the given policy area.

If
you do not already know it, look up who your member of Congress in the
House of Representatives is. Once you know his or her name, find your
representative’s home page on the House of Representative’s website to
learn more about him or her (background, committee assignments,
sponsored legislation, and so forth). In addition, you can use Project
Vote Smart’s website for biographical information as well as other
information. Then, choose a recent piece of legislation from Project
Vote Smart’s database of issues that is important to you and find out
how your representative voted on that bill. Did he or she vote the way
that you would have expected? Why did you think that your representative
would have voted in a particular way? Using the information that you
gathered from the various websites, try to determine why your
representative voted the way that he or she did, using the decision
criteria listed by Anderson as bases for your assertions (for example,
if you are examining the party affiliation criterion, did your
representative vote with the rest of his or her party?).

US House of Representatives USE ZIP CODE 33773

The
website for the House of Representatives allows you to find out who
your representative is by simply submitting your ZIP Code 33773. Individual
members also maintain homepages here with varying amounts of
information.

Project Vote Smart

The website for Project Vote Smart provides a wealth of information on
candidates and public officials, ranging from biographies to issue
stances and voting records on key issues.