The dean of the United States House of Representatives is the longest continuously serving member of the House. The current dean is Hal Rogers, a Republican from Kentucky, who has served in the House since 1981. The dean is a symbolic post, whose only customary duty is to swear in a speaker of the House after they are elected.[1] This responsibility was first recorded in 1819 but has not been observed continuously – at times, the speaker-elect was the current dean or the speaker-elect preferred to be sworn in by a member of their own party when the dean belonged to another party. The dean comes forward on the House Floor to administer the oath to the speaker-elect, before the new speaker then administers the oath to the other members.[2]
Because of other privileges associated with seniority, the dean is usually allotted some of the most desirable office space, and is generally either chair or ranking minority member of an influential committee.
It is unclear when the position first achieved concrete recognition, though the seniority system and increasing lengths of service emerged in the early 20th century. As late as 1924, Frederick H. Gillett was dean, and also speaker, before becoming a senator. Modern deans move into their positions so late in their careers that a move to the Senate is highly unlikely. When Ed Markey broke Gillett's record for time in the House before moving to the Senate in 2013 he was still decades junior to the sitting dean.
The deanship can change hands unexpectedly. In the 1952 election, Adolph J. Sabath became the first Representative elected to a 24th term, breaking the record of 23 terms first set by former Speaker Joseph Gurney Cannon, whose service had been non-consecutive, whereas Sabath's was not. North Carolina's Robert L. Doughton had not contested that election as he was retiring at the age of 89 years and two months, a House age record broken in 1998 by Sidney R. Yates, and again by Ralph Hall in 2012. However, Sabath died before the new term began and Doughton was dean for the old term's final months before Speaker Sam Rayburn became dean in the new Congress.
List of deans of the House
Years as dean are followed by name, party, state, and start of service in Congress.
All the members of the First Congress had equal seniority (as defined for the purpose of this article), but Muhlenberg, as the speaker, was the first member to be sworn in. Muhlenberg, Hartley and Thatcher were among the 13 members who attended the initial meeting of the House on March 4, 1789.
In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, some state delegations to the House were often not elected until after the term had begun. To avoid confusion, this fact is ignored in the list below.
The speaker of the United States House of Representatives, commonly known as the speaker of the House or House Speaker, is the presiding officer of the United States House of Representatives. The office was established in 1789 by Article I, Section II, of the U.S. Constitution. By custom and House rules, the speaker is the political and parliamentary leader of the House and is simultaneously its presiding officer, de facto leader of the body's majority party, and the institution's administrative head. Speakers also perform various other administrative and procedural functions. Given these several roles and responsibilities, the speaker usually does not personally preside over debates—that duty is instead delegated to members of the House from the majority party—nor regularly participate in floor debates.
Father of the House is a title that has been traditionally bestowed, unofficially, on certain members of some legislatures, most notably the House of Commons in the United Kingdom. In some legislatures the title refers to the longest continuously serving member, while in others it refers to the oldest member. Recently, the title Mother of the House or Mother of Parliament has also been used, although the usage varies among countries; it is either the female alternative to Father of the House, being applied when the relevant member is a woman, or refers to the oldest or longest-serving woman without reference to male members.
Robert Lee "Bob" Doughton, of Alleghany County, North Carolina, sometimes known as "Farmer Bob", was a member of the United States House of Representatives from North Carolina for 42 consecutive years (1911–1953). A Democrat originally from Laurel Springs, North Carolina, he was the Dean of the United States House of Representatives for his last few months in Congress. He is the longest-serving member ever of the United States House of Representatives from the state of North Carolina. In the 1930s Doughton was a key player in the creation of the Blue Ridge Parkway and the passage of the Social Security Act.
The clerk of the United States House of Representatives is an officer of the United States House of Representatives, whose primary duty is to act as the chief record-keeper for the House.
United States senators are conventionally ranked by the length of their tenure in the Senate. The senator in each U.S. state with the longer time in office is known as the senior senator; the other is the junior senator. This convention has no official standing, though seniority confers several benefits, including preference in the choice of committee assignments and physical offices. When senators have been in office for the same length of time, a number of tiebreakers, including previous offices held, are used to determine seniority. By tradition, the longest serving senator of the majority party is named president pro tempore of the Senate, the second-highest office in the Senate and the third in the line of succession to the presidency of the United States.
On January 3, 2021, the 1st day of the 117th Congress and 2 months after the 2020 U.S. House elections, the incoming members of the U.S. House of Representatives held an election for speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. It was the 127th U.S. speaker election since the office was created in 1789.
At the opening of the 68th United States Congress, the members-elect of the House of Representatives held an election for Speaker of the House on December 3–5, 1923. Republican Frederick H. Gillett received a majority of the votes cast in the 9th ballot and was re-elected speaker. This was the first multiple ballot speaker election since 1859–60, and the last until January 2023.
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