The Language of Delegation
An NLP Analysis of Congressional Bill Text
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12010703 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Austin Bussing (0000-0002-7631-5493, Department of Political Science Trinity University San Antonio Texas USA), Joshua Lerner (0000-0001-8451-7768, University of Chicago), Joshua Y Lerner (NORC at the University of Chicago Chicago Illinois USA), Gregory P Spell (Independent Scholar USA) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 50 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Publication date | 2025-06-05 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Legislative Studies Quarterly (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0362-9805 • E-ISSN: 1939-9162 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1111/lsq.70012 |
| OpenAlex | W4411109149 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 34 |
Delegation of powers from the legislature to the executive branch is a nearly ubiquitous feature of modern lawmaking. However, much of what scholars know about delegation is gleaned from an exclusive focus on landmark legislation. We introduce a method to identify delegating language across a larger universe of legislation. Using an active learning convolutional neural network on bill text, we classify bill sections by their delegation content, applying an iteratively improving coding scheme that enhances existing supervised learning approaches. We develop a novel dataset that allows us to answer important questions about interbranch relations. First, we find that legislator ideology, partisanship, and institutional position affect the delegatory content of introduced legislation. We then explore the role of delegation in the advancement of bills through the legislative process. Finally, we evaluate the ally principle, finding that variation in delegation is driven by cross‐agency differences in ideology and structural independence
Delegation · Linguistics · Natural language processing · Political science · Computer Science · Electoral Systems and Political Participation · Judicial and Constitutional Studies · Law · Philosophy · Political Influence and Corporate Strategies · Artificial Intelligence
Issue Politics in Congress
Committees in Congress
Setting the Agenda
Legislating in the Dark
Deliberate Discretion?
Turf Wars
Delegating Powers
Structure and Process, Politics and Policy
Choosing Strategies to Control the Bureaucracy
Active Learning Approaches for Labeling Text
Bureaucratic Discretion or Congressional Control? Regulatory Policymaking by the Federal Trade Commission
Understanding Delegation Through Machine Learning
Word Embeddings
Congressmen in Exile
Bill Sponsorship in Congress
Divided Government and the Design of Administrative Procedures
Secretaries of Pork? A New Theory of Distributive Public Policy
The Constraining Power of the Purse
How many major US laws delegate to federal agencies? (almost) all of them
Measuring Discretion and Delegation in Legislative Texts
Information and Confrontation in Legislative Oversight
Federal employee unionization and presidential control of the bureaucracy
What Makes an Agency Independent
Senators as Political Entrepreneurs
Divided Government and the Fragmentation of American Law
Separated Powers in the United States
Influencing the Bureaucracy
Where Is Presidential Power? Measuring Presidential Discretion Using Experts
Do Constituents Influence Issue-Specific Bill Sponsorship
Who Polices the Administrative State
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |