Members Speaking in 113th Congress
February 8, 2013
The 113th Congress has been in session for 15 days, although some of these are proforma days when nothing happens and no one speaks. Using the C-SPAN Video Library we can see which members have been active in the House during the first month. One thing we learn is that there are 72 freshmen representatives. Thirty-two of these freshmen have not spoken yet and twenty-one have spoken once. The table below shows the distribution of freshmen members speaking by party. There is not much difference in those who have spoken by party, but twice as many Democratic freshmen have not spoken on the floor compared to Republican freshmen. A number of freshmen participated in the reading of the Constitution on the floor.
| Days | Dem | Rep | Total |
| 0 | 22 | 10 | 32 |
| 1 | 10 | 11 | 21 |
| 2 | 4 | 8 | 11 |
| 3+ | 4 | 4 | 7 |
| Total | 40 | 32 | 72 |
If we look at all the other members we see the pattern shown in the table below.
| Days | Dem | Rep | Total |
| 0 | 76 | 98 | 174 |
| 1 | 38 | 54 | 92 |
| 2 | 26 | 33 | 59 |
| 3+ | 20 | 17 | 37 |
| Total | 160 | 202 | 362 |
There is no difference in the percentage of the freshmen who have not spoken and the nonfreshmen who have not spoken.
Two members stand out as speaking the most. One is a freshman, Rep. Messer (R-IN). He is president of the freshman class and has spoken six times. The other is a nonfreshman and a regular speaker, Rep. Jackson Lee (D-TX), who has also spoken six times. We will continue to keep an eye on who speaks and who doesn’t in the 113th Congress.
None of the fifteen freshmen senators have spoken yet on the Senfloor.
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