Slate has an interesting article how the US Congress is ignoring its Legislative responsibilities to pass constitutional laws and instead is passing unconstitutional ones with the knowledge that the US Supreme Court will strike them down.

From the article;

Last week, we watched as several senators voted for a bill redefining the treatment, detention, and trials of enemy combatants, even as they expressed doubts as to its constitutionality. The bill setting up military tribunals for enemy combatants, among other constitutional infirmities, contains a provision stripping courts of their power to review the constitutionality of the detentions. This provision, which suspends the writ of habeas corpus for current and future detainees, was contested by a number of senators, but the amendment that sought to excise it from the final bill failed by a vote of 51-49.

Before that amendment was rejected, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., chairman of the Senate judiciary committee, announced, "I'm not going to support a bill that's blatantly unconstitutional ... that suspends a right that goes back to [the Magna Carta in] 1215." He added, "I'd be willing, in the interest of party loyalty, to turn the clock back 500 years, but 800 years goes too far."

Specter's justification for then voting for a bill he deemed unconstitutional? "Congress could have done it right and didn't, but the next line of defense is the court, and I think the court will clean it up."

There is some irony in this congressional willingness to see the courts as some kind of constitutional chambermaid--as an entity that exists to clean up after Congress smashes up the room. It is especially ironic when it's articulated by members of Congress who like to invoke judicial restraint as a constitutional value. But it is beyond ironic, and approaching parody, when Congress asks the court to clean up a bill it knows to be unconstitutional, when the bill itself includes a court-stripping provision.

and;

The ongoing popular debates about the terms and parameters of "judicial activism" or "restraint" really have to be understood in institutional terms. Congress behaves strategically. When it is convenient, members of Congress will praise and advocate judicial restraint, and when it is not, they will rely on "activist" judicial intervention. Sen. Specter's argument during the Roberts and Alito hearings bears this out. Specter was distressed not that the court was too activist in striking down acts of Congress, but that it was too activist in striking down the wrong acts of Congress. Yet this judicial backstop serves Specter's goals when he is unwilling to make the call himself.

Whether one agrees or disagrees with any given view of what the Constitution requires, the strategic use of the court reduces accountability, it corrupts the lawmaking process, and it is deeply cynical. Lawmakers should take their constitutional obligations seriously. And if they do not take their own obligations seriously, then they have no right to criticize the judicial branch when it does.

Should the Supreme Court bail out Congress for the unconstitutional provisions of the new detainee legislation? Once again, it has no choice. But the real question is whether the public should bail them out. We can always choose not to.

In the movie Contact the main character, a scientist, is floating in some sort of transparent bathysphere above a galaxy, emotional over the vision, and comments, "They should have sent a poet." The first US Congress appointed John Beckley as the House of Representatives' Clerk. Rather than a politician, they should have chosen a historian.

From Robert Remeni's The House :

Once elected [Frederick] Muhlenberg was escorted to the chair, where he acknowledged the "distinguished" honor that had been bestowed upon him. The members then elected John Beckley, a young Virginian, as clerk. He had served in his state's legislature and was a friend of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.

Unfortunately he was neither an archivist nor a historian, and as clerk he was a disaster since he discarded many original documents once they had been copied or were no longer needed.

As a consequence, the processes by which bills were introduced, written and enacted during this most important first session of the [US] House of Representatives have been lost.

To a large extend, information on the workings of the House must be gleaned from contemporary newspapers and letters written by members to family and friends back home.

One of the Australian 'bearded men' from Federation has had all his correspondence and notes lost as well. I cannot recall his name, to my shame, but IIRC his wife burnt all his letters and notes upon his death.

When I was in old Parliament house the Nationals Party room was set up as it was in decades past. There was a musty smoke filled smell to the old leather presumably from Dunhills and Winfields being chain smoked. Future generations will probably be horrified that politicians used to smoke in parliament. I must admit to being a bit put-off by reading that US Congress was once adorned with spittoons.

It wasn't just spittoons, but snuff too. From Remini's book:

[snuff] container ... were strategically located around the House. It was not uncommon for a member to interrupt his oration, walk over to a silver urn, sample the fragrant Maccaboy or Old Scotch in the urn, let fire with a sneeze or two, wipe his nose and calmly resume his tirade.

Additionally the members of Congress would drink during the day a mix of rum, ginger, molasses and water. Unsurprisingly this tended to liven debates somewhat.

Committees hold great power in US Congress, they not only write legislation but can also hold up private member bills such that they never get to the floor to be voted upon. Due to the rise of the career politician in the 20thC, committees began to be dominated by seniority rather than merit which allowed strong Committee heads to have incredible influence - to the point of obstinacy. Judge Smith 's Rules Committee was one such example.

It is unclear from Remini's book how it came about but the Rules Committee managed to get itself as independent from the Speaker of the House as well as the House of Representatives. It became a small unaccountable oligarchy inside the House.

The Rules Committee was promptly taken over by the Southern Democrats in the 1940s. Back then a major concern of the Southern Democrats was the civil rights legislation at the federal level. Judge Smith figured prominently in trying to get the Civil Rights Act of 1957, delayed, killed and made unpalatable to the Senate. He was out-manoeuvred by Sam Rayburn who was Speaker of the House.

In 1960 John F. Kennedy won the presidency over Richard Nixon. The House comprised 263 Democrats and 174 Republicans, which despite the majority the Democrats seem to have from the number, was not guaranteed. In the Civil Rights Act voting the Democrats split 50-50 with southern Democrats voting against the bill. The act passed due to unanimous Republican support.

There was also the issue of the Rules Committee where Judge Smith used its undue power to halt legislation such that it was not voted on. Apparently Rayburn "declared, the new President had a right to have his program considered before the House." So there began political manoeuvring to break the Rules Committee oligarchy by making it larger or by replacing one of the older Democrat members on it.

From Remini's book:

President Kennedy tried to help, and learned an important lesson in the process. He met with Congressional leadership and, after dispensing with some routine business, turned to the subject on everyone's mind. ""Now I'd like to talk about the Rules Committee," he announced.

Suddenly, the flat of Rayburn's hand hit the table with a resounding smack. It was like a gunshot. "No Sir," he shouted. "That is House business, and the House of Representatives will decide that. The White House [Executive] has no business there at all."

Everyone in the room froze. They were shocked. No one moved or said a word. Kennedy realised his mistake and quickly moved onto another topic.

But every House member soon learned how their Speaker had stood up to the President and reasserted their rights.

We wouldn't see that tension in the lower house of the Australian Parliaments as the PM/Premier is both the Executive and leader of the Legislative majority.