Fighting for the speakership : the House and the rise of party government / Jeffery A. Jenkins, Charles Stewart III.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Introduction -- The evolving roles and responsibilities of House officers in the antebellum era -- Organizational politics under the secret ballot -- Bringing the selection of House officers into the open -- Shoring up partisan control: the speakership elections of 1839 and 1847 -- Partisan tumult on the floor: the speakership elections of 1849 and 1855-56 -- The speakership and the rise of the Republican Party -- Caucus governance and the rise of the organizational cartel, 1861-1891 -- The organizational cartel persists, 1891-2011 -- Conclusion -- Appendix 1. Summary of house organization, 1st-112th Congress (1789-2011) -- Appendix 2. Election of house speaker, 1st-112th Congresses -- Appendix 3. Election of House clerk, 1st-112th Congresses -- Appendix 4. Election of House printer, 15th-36th Congresses -- Appendix 5. Summary of democratic and Republican speaker caucus nominations, 38th-112th Congresses -- Appendix 6. Democratic and Republican caucus nominations for speaker, 38th-112th Congresses.

Online resource; title from .pdf information screen (Ebsco, viewed November 6, 2012).

The Speaker of the House of Representatives is the most powerful partisan figure in the contemporary U.S. Congress. How this came to be, and how the majority party in the House has made control of the speakership a routine matter, is far from straightforward. Fighting for the Speakership provides a comprehensive history of how Speakers have been elected in the U.S. House since 1789, arguing that the organizational politics of these elections were critical to the construction of mass political parties in America and laid the groundwork for the role they play in setting the agenda of Congress today.

eBooks on EBSCOhost EBSCO eBook Subscription Academic Collection - Worldwide