The House elects a new speaker by roll call vote when it first convenes after a general election for its two-year term, or when a speaker dies, resigns or is removed from the position intra-term. A majority of votes cast (as opposed to a majority of the full membership of the House) is necessary to elect a speaker.[1] If no candidate receives a majority vote, then the roll call is repeated until a speaker is elected.[3] The Constitution does not require the speaker to be an incumbent member of the House, although every speaker thus far has been.[4] Altogether, 56 individuals, from 24 states, have served as speaker of the House.
List of speakers
The House has elected a speaker 128 times since 1789:[3] at the start of each of the 118 congresses, plus on 10 occasions when a vacancy arose during a Congress via death, resignation, or motion to vacate. Of the 56 people who have served as speaker of the House over the past 235 years, 32 served multiple terms; seven of them served nonconsecutive terms: Frederick Muhlenberg, Henry Clay, John W. Taylor, Thomas Brackett Reed, Joseph W. Martin Jr., Sam Rayburn, and Nancy Pelosi. Altogether, there have been 65 occasions on which a new speaker took office. Every speaker of the House has been a member of a political party or faction; the number affiliated with each is:
The durations mentioned below are calculated based on date differences; if one were to count by the number of calendar days, all the values would be one day longer.
Additionally, since many speakers held office for multiple terms, often with non-consecutive periods, the time listed for each speaker represents the total length of their time as speaker. It is important to note that the period between the adjournment of one Congress and the convening of the next Congress is not included in the calculations. For instance, Nathaniel Macon served as speaker during both the 8th and 9th Congresses, but the eight-month gap between the two Congresses is not included in his service duration. The exact dates of service for each individual speaker is shown in the Term of service column of the above table.
Official seal of the Speaker of the United States House of RepresentativesSam Rayburn, longest serving speaker of the House, 17 years, 53 days (cumulative)Tip O'Neill, longest uninterrupted tenure of office, 9 years, 350 daysTheodore M. Pomeroy, shortest tenure of office, 1 day
1 2 During James K. Polk's tenure as Speaker, the Jacksonian bloc amalgamated into the modern Democratic Party.
1 2 John Taylor served as speaker twice in the 1820s; initially he was as a member of the Democratic–Republican Party, and later, when the party began to fracture, he sided with its pro–Adams faction.
1 2 Frederick Muhlenberg served as speaker twice in the 1790s, before political factions coalesced into formal parties; initially he identified with the pro–administration faction, but later he aligned himself with the anti–administration faction.
↑ The district listed is the district the speaker represented at the time they were in office, which may be different in different Congresses due to redistricting.
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