Note 42. The Senate Majority Leader's Right of First Recognition

The Strange Precedent

Senate majority leaders say that their office comes with only one formal power—the right of first recognition.  It is interpreted as a precedent that requires the presiding officer to recognize the majority leader and then the minority leader if the leader and other senators are seeking recognition simultaneously. In practice, the presiding officer simply looks to the majority leader whenever he or she is looking to call on another senator. The ability to be recognized before other senators gives the majority leader an opportunity to address the Senate, make a motion, and propound unanimous consent agreements before another senator can do so. This gives the majority leader an opportunity to try to set the agenda of the Senate.

Remarkably, the right of first recognition was not officially recognized in the Senate until 1937.  However, a majority leader was recognized in the Senate by 1913 and some of the practices associated with a floor leader surely were established before 1937. By the early 1920s, it appears to have become common practice to recognize the majority and minority leaders before turning to other senators.  Writing in 1922, William Tyler Page, clerk of the House of the Representatives, noted that the two Senate floor leaders “are parliamentary and political mouthpieces, and are usually accorded prior recognition by the Chair.”^[i]  A review of the Congressional Record in these years suggests that the majority leader usually had little problem gaining recognition to address the Senate or make a motion.  Nevertheless, there is no mention of a practice or right of first recognition in a fairly thorough dissertation on Senate leadership written in 1930.^[ii] 

In the 1930s, John Nance Garner, presiding over the Senate as Franklin Roosevelt’s vice president, had occasion to explain his view of the proper practices. Having served previously as speaker of the House, where he enjoyed the power to recognize members without appeal, Garner was then serving in an institution in which Rule XIX required the presiding officer to call on the senator who first seeks recognition but in which multiple senators may seek recognition simultaneously. A hint of Garner’s attitude was expressed in May, 1933, when he indicated that he was obligated to recognize a senator in charge of legislation before recognizing other senators (Cong. Rec., 1933, 4149).  He made his statement in reference to Carter Glass (D, Va.), who was managing a landmark banking bill for the majority party that he had coauthored. As far as I can tell, the majority leader, Joseph Robinson (D-AR), was not on the floor at the time.

Recognition of a floor leader became an issue for Alben Barkley on August 11, 1937, three weeks after he had been elected to replace Robinson, who died in mid-July of heart failure.  Just after the Senate completed action on a bill, Robert Wagner (D, N.Y.) was recognized and made a motion to proceed to the consideration of an anti-lynching bill.  Barkley intervened to say that he had arranged for other measures to be considered that day, outlining his order of business and the specific senators who were to speak on each bill.  Vice President Garner acknowledged that he was familiar with Barkley’s agenda, but that neither of the senators identified by Barkley was on the floor when Wagner sought recognition.  Garner cited his responsibilityto recognize the first senator seeking recognition: “The Chair wants not only the Senator from Kentucky [Barkley] but the entire membership of the Senate to understand that it is the duty of the Chair…to recognize the Senator who is addressing the Chair” (Cong. Rec., 11 Aug. 1937, 8694).  “When three Senators are on their feet demanding recognition, the Chair has the privilege of choosing the one to recognize; but when only one Senator is standing and demanding recognition, the Chair has no choice.”  Wagner agreed with Garner’s understanding of the rules, insisting that he had the right to be recognized.  Barkley tried to adjourn the Senate, but the motion to adjourn was defeated.  The Republican leader, McNary, then moved to recess, and the motion succeeded, a serious embarrassment to Barkley.

Over the next day or two, Barkley and Garner consulted with each other and agreed to discuss Barkley’s floor agenda before the start of each session so that the vice president knew Barkley’s plans and could look to the majority leader to be recognized. Then Garner explicitly laid out the right of first recognition (Cong. Rec., 13 Aug. 1937, 8840).  “The Chair recognized the Senator from Kentucky because he is the leader on the Democratic side of the Chamber,” Garner explained.  “He would recognize the Senator from Vermont [Mr. Austin], acting Republican leader, in the same way.”  Pressed by Robert La Follette (R-WI), who did not challenge the practice of first recognizing the majority leader but insisted that the majority leader did not have the right to “[farm] out the floor” to another senator when others were seeking recognition in their own right, Garner then clarified his understanding of the right of first recognition.  While the majority leader “cannot farm out his time,” Garner explained, the leader had the right to suggest who should be recognized if there were multiple senators seeking recognition and the presiding officer would follow the leader’s suggestion (Cong. Rec., 13 Aug. 1937, 8839-40).  A few months later, Garner reiterated his policy that when one of the two floor leaders is seeking recognition at the same time as other senators, the majority leader and then the minority leader would be given priority recognition (Cong. Rec., 21 Feb. 1938, 2202).^[iii] 

Garner’s statements formed an unusual precedent.  It was not a ruling or Senate vote in response to a formal point of order.  In fact, Barkley, who later served as vice president himself, later observed that “the rules don’t require it, but it is a moral obligation and the custom of the chair to recognize a majority leader because he is the leader of the Senate and he maps the program.”^[iv]

It is not entirely clear how much Garner’s 1937 explanation changed everyday practice.  Majority leaders before Barkley do not seem to have had much difficulty seeking recognition.  In everyday practice, senators in the 1910s, 1920s, and 1930s did not often attempt to get the jump on the floor leaders and the presiding officer looked to recognize the majority leader or bill manager before another senator. However sketchy our understanding of practice before 1937, the right of first recognition is a foundation of a majority party’s efforts to set the agenda for the Senate.

[More detail on developments in Senate leadership and procedure the 1930s will be available in Gerald Gamm and Steven S. Smith, Steering the Senate: The Emergence of Party Organization and Leadership, 1789-2024 (Cambridge University Press, forthcoming)]

---

^[i] William Tyler Page,“Political Organization of Congress Explained.” Congressional Digest (1922) 1 (11): 23; Mitch McConnell and Roy E. Brownell II, The U.S. Senate and the Commonwealth: Kentucky Lawmakers and the Evolution of Legislative Leadership. (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2019), 157-162.

^[ii] Donnelly, Thomas Claude.  1930. “Party Leadership in the United States Senate.” Ph.D. diss., New York University.

^[iii] Floyd  M. Riddick, Riddick’s Senate Procedure: Precedents and Practices, Government Printing Office, 1992, 1094.

^[iv] Alben W. Barkley Oral History Project, University of Kentucky Libraries, 22 July 1953, BARK007.  Even before this episode, there was a well-established precedent that the presiding officer’s recognition of a senator could not be appealed or be subject to a point of order.  Thus Rule XIX and the earlier precedent clearly implied that, if several senators were simultaneously seeking recognition, the presiding officer could use his discretion to recognize party leaders before other senators.