7/21/2019 Donald Wolfensberger on the power of the Committee of the Whole 1992

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To assert that the Committee of the Whole is nothing more than

another advisory committee to the House is to completely

misread history and misrepresent the true nature of such

committees. In the final analysis, the Committee of the Whole,

with its special authority for revenue and spending bills, is thevery essence of the House exercising its special powers and

prerogatives under the Constitution.

Madison, in Federalist No. 58, put it this way:

The House of Representatives cannot only refuse, but they alonecan propose the supplies requisite for the support of government.

They, in a word, hold the purse--that powerful instrument. . . .This power over the purse may, in fact, be regarded as the most

complete and effectual weapon with which any constitution can

arm the immediate representatives of the people, for obtaining aredress of every grievance, and for carrying into effect every justand salutary measure. 47

The Committee of the Whole remains today the critical device by

which the House, acting together as the immediate

representatives of the people, retains its unique control over the

purse that powerful instrument. It is, in every sense of the

term, the House of Representatives exercising its most

fundamental legislative powers as granted under Article I of theConstitution.

47 Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, TheFederalist Papers (New York: The New American Library of

Congressional Record103rd Congress (1993-1994 - 6/21/15, 1:47 PM / 26Literature, Inc., 1962 ed.), p. 359.