Authorizing the Work of Government

This chapter looks at the authorizing committees in Congress, and in particular at how the work of directing the government is divided among them. It considers the impact of the institution's failure to handle its workload in a timely fashion. The chapter examines that critical issue is the practice of including direct spending provisions in authorizing legislation. It also looks at the special case of authorizing legislation that results in what is called direct spending. All of the authorizing committees have authority over important parts of the government, but not all committees are created equal. The House Ways and Means Committee has an almost identical jurisdiction, minus Medicaid. When Congress chooses to fund programs whose authorizations of appropriations have expired, in most cases the substantive policy guidelines for the conduct of those programs as set forth in the authorizing bill are still in effect.