Louise Slaughter as a Congresswoman - Research Paper Example

? LOUISE SLAUGHTER of affiliation Introduction The United s is a large nation. Inaddition, the nation has a very large population. There is only one federal government and respective state governments representing the people. The representation of the people in the legislature is done at different levels. Representatives of the people from different constituent states meet at the congress. Congress is an official body that houses meetings of representatives who have been elected or appointed to represent a state in a legislature. The term Congress in the United States has two applications (Kura, 2001). First, Congress refers to the Senate or national bicameral legislature. Secondly, Congress refers to the House of Representatives. In the Senate, members are referred to as senators while Representatives are the members in the House of Representatives (Heath, 1999). Persons who are members of both the Senate and House of Representatives are members of congress. Representatives are also referred to as congressmen or congresswomen. The current congress is the 113th and was elected in November 2012. The House of Representatives has 435 members while the Senate has 100 members. The members of US congress are elected to represent people in fifty states. Since the congress representatives are elected, it is possible to have a Congress whose representatives have unequal racial representation. The two Congress chambers are separate. However, they both participated equally in the enactment of legislation. The congress must hold one joint meeting in a year to agree on the convening and adjourning dates and count the presidential votes. The ability of the Congress to enact laws is the sanction of that effects other congress actions. The discussion in this paper focuses on the congresswoman named Louise Slaughter. In the discussion, Louise Slaughter is analyzed for her key achievements, voting records, important committee assignments, and leadership positions. Current position of Louise Mclntosh Slaughter Louise was born on 14 August 1929. Today, Slaughter is the New York’s representative for 28th congressional district. She has served in this position since 1993. The political party membership is Democratic Party. Slaughter’s district of representation is found in Rochester, New York. This district partially comprises of counties of Orleans and Monroe in New York. Since 1987 to 1993, Slaughter represented New York’s 30th District. The United States Congressional elections were held in November of the year 2012. In these elections, Slaughter’s victory was over Maggie Brooks who had been county representative since 2004. Her representation is now in the restructured 25th District. This District is entirely found in Monroe County except for Rush, Mendon, Hamlin, Wheatland, and part of Clarkson. Slaughter has formerly been the chairperson of the House Rules Committee. Her leadership in this Committee lasted from 2007 to 2011. Other membership roles include ranking minority member as from 2011. After her reelection, Slaughter vowed to fight for issues of Medicare and Social security. She also vowed to fight for the Violence against Women Act renewal (Alaimo, 2012). In most of her career, Slaughter has spent time fighting for the safety, opportunities and health. In addition, Louise is the co-founder of the Bi-partisan Pro Choice Caucus and Co-author of violence against Women Act. Slaughter has also greatly advocated for the protection of the nation’s troops by ensuring that troops have the needed armor. According to slaughter, she feels that those responsible for protecting the nation should also be protected. Louise has been considered as a true reformer. For now, Slaughter is fighting to pass the Stock Act in her efforts to clean up Washington. Through this act, Congress members will not be in a position to make money in the stock market using insider information. This move will protect million of citizens since her support will not be compromised any partisan political interests (Mclntire, 2012). Slaughter’s Life Education and Political Career Born to Oscar Lewis and Daisy Grace Mclntosh, Slaughter had two sister and two brothers. Slaughter took a career in public health and microbiology after one of her sisters, Virginia, died of pneumonia at childhood. Slaughter was born in Lynch, Kentucky. However, her family moved to Monticello, Kentucky where she attended her high school education. After graduation, Slaughter later moved to lexicon for her university education at University of Kentucky. As an undergraduate student, Slaughter studied microbiology before earning a Master’s public health degree from the University of Kentucky (WSJ, 2012). While working with a major chemicals’ manufacturer after her masters’ degree, Slaughter gained interest in community affairs and local political issues. These concerns drove her to run for Monroe County legislature. The journey was difficult and she first won in her third trial. After her victory, Slaughter was requested by Mario Cuomo to take up the role of his regional coordinator. Slaughter was to fulfill the regional coordinator role for the area of Rochester. The re-election of Cuomo made her to retain her position as Rochester area’s regional coordinator. In 1982, Slaughter decided to run for New York state assembly. This move was driven by the urge from local democrats who approached her and expressed their desires to see her run against Tom Hanna, the then incumbent in a United States republican party. Two years later, Slaughter was re-elected even though it was on a narrow margin. This re-election motivated Slaughter to run for Democratic nominations for New York’s 30th congressional district. Since 1910, Slaughter would be the first Democrat with interests to represent New York’s 30th district. In her victory for this position, Slaughter was also the first woman representing Western New York. In addition, she was the first woman to be elected to a full term from the 30th district since its inception in 1893 (WSJ, 2012). Congresswoman The service term for each congressperson is two years. During this period, the representative serves people from a particular congressional District. The representative has the role of introducing bills, serving in committees, and other duties obliged to them. Life at the US House of representatives began with Slaughter’s election in the 30th District in 1986. Since then, Slaughter has been in the House of Representatives among the New York Congressional delegation. United States census has continually caused redistricting caused her to represent several of New York’s districts (Louise, n.d). Key achievements During her representative roles in the Congress, Slaughter has sponsored or co- sponsored the passing of numerous bills. In the US, the proposal of Bills is done within the appropriate committee. While some bills make it to the Senate or the floor of the house, others do not make it out of the committee. The 2007-2008 National Journal ranked Slaughter the most progressive member in the House of Representatives. Among the numerous Democratic congressmen and senators, Slaughter was posted in the Democratic Blog named Daily Kos (Louise, n.d). The dedication of slaughter to her constituents is visible through her strong voice on National issues. She has progressively fought for relevant national issues ranging from Afghanistan war to Global trade and reforms in government and genetics. As a congresswoman, Slaughter played an important role in drafting and passing the Affordable Care Act. Slaughter fought to see that the bill was fully paid for and that no deficit would arise from it. As a microbiologist, Slaughter has contributed to the writing of competent legislation to safeguard US citizens from genetic discrimination. President Bush passed GINA or Genetic Information Discrimination Act into law in May 2008. At first, GINA was referred to as “the first civil rights legislation for 21st century.” The role of the Act is to prevent discrimination on genetic makeup basis from employers and providers of health insurance. The efficiency of this Bill was contributed by Slaughter’s expertise in issues of genetics (Genone.gov, 2012). On 4 April 2012, President Barrack Obama signed the Stock Act into law. Slaughter authored this bill, which prevents the use of insider information by congress members. In addition, the Act prohibits the members of congress from profiting through their responsibility as representatives of the American citizens. This Act is meant to ensure that everyone is responsibly accountable for similar rules. The persistence of Slaughter is visible in the passing of this bill, which she introduced in 2006. Through the Act, elected officials are required to offer public notifications in times of key transactions in trade. In addition, the law demonstrated that everyone is below the law and should equally benefit from relevant stock information. Previously, Slaughter was responsible for the passing of the Violence against Women Act in te year 1994. The act made the Department of Justice and Violence against Women office (Mclntire, 2012). Slaughter’s Important Committee Assignments and Leadership Positions Slaughter is well known as a forefront advocate for the rights of women. At the national and local level, she has consistently engaged in advocacy and legislation. Her leadership position has been evident in 108th Congress when she served as the Congressional Caucus for women issues as the co-chair. Currently, Slaughter continues to serve as the Bipartisan Congressional Pro-Choice Caucus co-chair (Louise, n.d). In addition, Slaughter continues to be a leading advocate against sexual assaults in the military. In March 2004, Slaughter organized sexual assault in the military hearing. This hearing played the relevant role of garnering the nation’s attention. In order to reinforce the relevance of the issue, Slaughter authored the amendment to the Department of Defense and Authorization bill in FY05. This bill required comprehensive procedures and policies to be put in place by the Pentagon. These policies and procedures would handle military sexual assault. With successful amendment, Slaughter introduced further changes to terminate sexual assault, military related stalking and domestic violence. She introduced the sexual assault, military stalking and domestic violence in each congress and in the end won funding for the health of women. This was possible through her introduction of the Military Domestic and Sexual violence Act. In the bill, Slaughter called for the introduction of the permanent office of the victims advocate, this office was to be founded within the Defense Department. It was intended at improving access to services for victims of these issues (WSJ, 2012). Slaughter’s achievements are visible through her efforts that resulted to increases in the funding for the health of women. The first of these increments was attained in the 1990s when the congress set aside five hundred dollars for research in breast cancer. This research was to be carried out in the National Institute of Health or NIH. In her fight, Slaughter guaranteed that all federal trials incorporated women and minorities. She also fought for the establishment of an office of research on women health. The bills on the funding of six nationwide centers focusing on women health by NIH and increased research on women health as impacted by hormone disruptors were also introduced by Slaughter (Louise, n.d). Louise (n.d) adds that Slaughter also has committee assignments on security commission on security and cooperation in Europe. This commission was established by the congress with the aim supervising and promoting compliance with commitments of the OSCE or Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and Helsinki Final Act. The commission is US Government Independent Agency. In this commission, Slaughter is one of the nine members of the House of Representatives. Other leadership positions for Slaughter include the Future of American Media Caucus Co-chair, and se was the first woman to chair the United State House Rules Committee. Voting record on key issues Slaughter is also a ranking member of the House Rules Committee. In her position, Slaughter has overseen a critical step in legislative process. In this House, the main aim is for lawmakers to decide how a bill comes to the house floor as well as possible attempts that can be done for legislation changes. In this position, Slaughter led republicans against the health care reform during the 2010 debate. The republicans dubbed the Slaughter Solution and criticized it. This move was intended at freeing house members from directly voting on the senate version of the controversial bill. In this case, the House of Rules Committee would have been required to approve the process (Mclntire, 2012). In the case of the Healthcare reform bill Supreme Court Ruling, Slaughter’s reaction demonstrated the bill as positive. In June 2012, she commended the bill as responsible for improved access to healthcare for millions of citizens. Her advocacy against women discrimination resulted to the emphasis that the healthcare reform act verified that being a woman was not a preexisting condition and higher premium justifications. Previous efforts to support women rights were done in 2004 when she fought for efforts to subpoena women’s medical records by the Justice department for women with partial pre-birth abortions. The proposal for subpoenas was a move to show the willingness of administration to restrict the right of a woman to choose at any cost (WSJ, 2012). WSJ (2012) further adds that in the approximately $800 billion economic stimulus bill, Slaughter supported the bill. In addition, Slaughter opposed numerous agreements on free trade despite the region being heavily dependent on free trade. In her reasoning, Slaughter argued that the country is no longer interested on a giveaway trade era. This is because countries like Germany and China continually racing to dominate the green manufacturing for generations in future. Through free trade, United States would lose the race and experience economical effect. In order to support her criticism, Slaughter argued that the loss of manufacturing jobs was enough proof. In addition, Slaughter argued that the American economy was undermined by free trade. Conclusion The discussion in this paper has focused on Louise Slaughter as a congresswoman. The life of Slaughter in the US house of representative began in 1986 when she was elected to represent 30th district. In the course of her role as a representative, Slaughter has sponsored and co-sponsored numerous bills. Among others, some of her prominent authored bills that have been passed into law include Stock Act of 2012 and GINA. Stock Act was intended at ensuring that the congress remains under the law through issuance of notices for stock transactions and not just benefiting themselves with profits. GINA prevents discrimination against Americans based on their genetic makeup. Slaughter has also been obliged with great leadership roles like the co-chairing of congressional Arts of Caucus and a ranking member of the House Rules Committee among others. References Alaimo, J. (2012). Louise Slaughter defeats Maggie Brooks, earns return trip to D.C. Retrieved from http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20121106/NEWS01/311060046/Louise-Slaughter-defeats-Maggie-Brooks-in-25th-Congressional-District?nclick_check=1 Genome.gov, (2012). Genetic non discrimination federal legislation archive. Retrieved from http://www.genome.gov/11510239 Heath, D. (1999). The Congress of the United States. Mankato, Minnesota: Capstone Press. Kura, O. N. (2001). Congress of the United States: power, structure and procedures. Huntington, New York: Nova Science Publishers, Inc. Louise, (n.d). Biography. Retrieved from http://www.louise.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=39&Itemid=84 Mclntire, L. (2012). Louise slaughter’s Landmark STOCK Act signed into law. Retrieved from http://emilyslist.org/blog/louise_slaughter_landmark_stock_act_signed_into_law Wall Street Journal, (2012). Louise Slaughter: US Representative-NY25. Retrieved from http://projects.wsj.com/campaign2012/candidates/view/louise-slaughter--NY-H Read More