Fighting for the Speakership: The House and the Rise of Party Government

"An excellent look at the history of majority party leadership in the House."—Choice

"[T]his is, overall, a sound and illuminating analysis."—R. Scott Burnet, Historian

"The Speaker of the House is the third-highest constitutional office in the United States. Yet political scientists and historians have largely ignored how the House chooses the holder of this exalted position. No longer—Jenkins and Stewart have convincingly placed the contest for the speakership at the center of the historical development of Congress."—Nolan McCarty, Princeton University

"The development of an 'organizational cartel' has been central to the evolution of political parties in the U.S. House. The parties control access to committee and leadership slots. Whether this has allowed parties to control policy is a separate and contingent matter. Jenkins and Stewart press this theoretical distinction and offer much else in this excellent and authoritative work of congressional history."—David Mayhew, Yale University

"This is an ambitious and impressive piece of scholarship with extraordinary historical sweep. Urging scholars to move beyond the study of the majority party's procedural control of the agenda, Jenkins and Stewart grapple with the organizational evolution of the House and the starring role ultimately played in that institutional drama by the majority party caucus. This is a must-read for students of Congress and America's political development."—Sarah Binder, George Washington University and the Brookings Institution

"Fighting for the Speakership makes a new and important contribution to our knowledge of the role of speakership contests in the development of party organization in the House of Representatives. Most previous scholarship begins with the observation that majority parties firmly control the House's top organizational positions. Jenkins and Stewart show that this was not always the case."—Steven S. Smith, author of Party Influence in Congress