Nonlegislative Hearings and Policy Change in Congress

A theory of conflict-expansion and issue-redefinition is used to explain jurisdictional changes among congressional committees. Strict rules regulate the jurisdictions of committees considering legislation, but greater freedom is allowed in nonlegislative hearings. Therefore entrepreneurial committee and subcommittee chairs will use nonlegislative hearings to claim future jurisdiction over new issues and to force recalcitrant rival committees to take action they might not otherwise take. All committee hearings from 1945 to 1986 covering drug abuse, nuclear power, pesticides, and smoking are analyzed using various statistical techniques. Interviews with committee staff supplement the analysis. Both legislative and nonlegislative hearings are shown to be subject to considerable jurisdictional change over time. Nonlegislative hearings are shown to be particularly important in the process of issue-redefinition and in the efforts of legislative entrepreneurs to encroach on established jurisdictions of other committees.