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What were the nineteen seventies reforms Julian there's many one reform is that the party
caucus meaning the party the body of democrats and republicans in the house and senate gain
power to vote on whether somebody should be a committee chair it becomes a normal procedure
so every year they scrutinize who the chairmen of the committees are so if they don't like
a Wilbur Mills or a Howard Smith they vote 'em out you got it nineteen seventy four they
vote out Wilbur Mills nineteen seventy five they vote out three of the most powerful chairmen
who were they WR Pogue Edward Ebert and Wright Patman who are forced to come before the Watergate
babies and say why should you be chair and they vote 'em out this was as you describe
an amazing thing to the older people seventy year old guys and they're saying we don't
want you anymore they are stunned and it was a big moment another reform is to open up
the process so committee hearings are open to the public and to reporters probably more
important you mean the committee hearings weren't open before no most committee hearings
were closed openness increases dramatically in the nineteen seventies the public doesn't
know what you're doing no and again reporters to had much less access they had to rely on
getting it from key staff you know television is allowed into the chambers ethics rules
are passed in nineteen seventy seven which codify rules about a lot of things which again
before were allowed how much income can you earn if you're a legislator by making speeches
and all of a sudden in nineteen seventy seven now what is the importance of that well the
idea was to clean up government you wanted to limit the influences on legislators so
if they're going around speaking to interest groups making a lot of money tha's not necessarily
can't pay somebody fifty thousand dollars to make a speech you got it which is bribery
but please call it speechified you got it and legislators would get caught in that like
Jim Wright and Newt Gingrich would get caught in those rules yeah so those are more of the
the number of senators needed to end a filibuster is reduced in nineteen seventy five that's
seen as a big change that's sixty from sixty six you got it it's a small number but in
politics it's a lot that's a big deal those are just some of the reforms the one man one
vote ruling from the sixties in the supreme court ends population inequality in districts
congressional districts what does that mean that rural districts don't have more power
than urban districts after the nineteen sixties which had been a major source of power for
these southerners who had votes from depopulated areas and they and so there's tons of reform
I mean it's really that's one of the remarkable things is that reformers in that period don't
look at one issue they're trying to change the way the whole thing works yeah so today
you have McCain Feingold the campaign finance focusing on one issue soft money in cmpaigns
that's about the extent of reform in government this was a period when they were looking at
the whole picture and these are just some the sub committee bill of rights is another
thing that passes yeah all within the spate of about seven or eight years yeah This excerpt
is brought to you by the Massachusetts School of Law