The House of Representatives is a complex legislative institution that was designed as the ''people's branch'' of the federal Congress. This branch was founded on the notion of direct representation of geographical districts from which constituents elect a representative to serve for two years.

The House has evolved from rather modest beginnings in the late eighteenth century, when neither public business nor the national budget required complex legislative instrumentalities, to the present congressional system of twenty-two standing committees and more than a hundred subcommittees. The committee structure enables its members to examine federal laws, agencies, and budgets in depth. Committee members then report their recommendations to the full House.

The complexities of Congress and the committee system result in part from the extraordinary breadth of the nation itself. Just contemplate the diversity of interests represented by the various states from Hawaii to Maine, from Florida to Alaska. The needs of these states and their people have common threads, but the differences are sufficient to have brought down a government in Europe many times. Similarly, the variations in religious beliefs and demographics are enough to have collapsed other forms of governments. When one contemplates that there are more than 39,500 separate and distinct political and governmental jurisdictions in the United States that may play a role in reaching national legislative decisions, it is nothing short of a miracle that legislation is passed at all.

Bills or resolutions are the major focus of the legislative function of Congress and its members. Bills emerge from many sources. Members themselves, along with their staffs, develop many proposals. Contacts with constituents often are useful in helping members identify problems requiring legislative solutions. Committee and subcommittee staffs are sources for amendments or bills. And both the House and the Senate have offices of legislative counsel - lawyers who specialize in drafting bills.

Another source of legislation is the executive branch. Most presidents come into of f ice with an extensive legislative agenda, and most propose numerous bills to Congress. Typically, modern presidents are most effective legislatively in the first portion of their four-year term of office. This ''honeymoon'' period is associated with the president's generally high popular standing immediately after the election.

Lobbyists are still another source of legislation. Congressional support agencies, such as the General Accounting Office, the Congressional Budget Office, the Office of Technology Assessment, and the Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress, also provide members and committees with ideas and language for bills or resolutions.

A bill can go through many drafts before a satisfactory version results. Members seek cosponsors among their colleagues to join in introducing the bill. The advantage of cosponsorship is broad-based support toward passage of the bill; the downside is that cosponsors may exact modifications in the proposal as the price for their support.

A sponsor introduces a bill by placing it in the ''hopper,'' a wire basket at the lower left corner of the Speaker's rostrum in the House chamber. The bill is accepted by the bill clerk, an employee of the House. The House parliamentarian assigns a number and directs the bill to the appropriate committee of jurisdiction. Bills are referred by the Speaker, but the actual referral decisions are almost always made by the parliamentarian on the Speaker's behalf. Complex bills may be referred to two or more committees (this is known as joint or multiple referral).

Once the committee of jurisdiction has been determined, the bill is sent physically to the committee. The committee chairman and staff may choose to do nothing with the bill. If action is deemed appropriate, however, the staff will set up hearings and announce their plans to other legislators, lobbyists, and the press. Hearings are under the control of the committee or subcommittee chairman. When the chairman bangs the gavel on the rostrum, the hearing commences. Hearings are conducted by the chairman unless he or she relinquishes the gavel to a colleague (usually of the majority party) while attending to other duties.

The committee is run according to the rules of the House of Representatives and the rules established by committee members at the beginning of each new Congress. For the most part, these rules are derived from the rules of the previous Congress. Committee rules cannot contradict the rules of the House.

COMMITTEE HEARINGS
Overview
The committee hearing stage is one of the most important and most interesting of the entire legislative process. Unlike citizens in many political systems, American citizens can participate in forming legislation by speaking before members of Congress in a public forum. Hearings also provide members with an occasion to champion causes and further the interests of their districts or states.

Purpose of Committee Hearings
One important purpose of the committee hearing is to determine the positions of various interests throughout the country concerning the legislation being considered. Members of Congress who wish to testify before committee hearings are usually heard as a matter of courtesy and protocol.

After members have presented their testimony, witnesses for the executive branch often are heard. These witnesses express the administration policy and speak for the president as the head of the administration. Each administration witness, regardless of rank, appears before Congress as a delegate of the president of the United States and is so perceived by Congress. These witnesses may indicate a president's support or opposition to the bill or proposed amendments and may hint at whether the president is likely to sign the bill or veto it.

Often the committee staff send the bills to be heard to the appropriate departments in the executive branch for comments in advance of the hearings. Thus, the committee has some idea of the executive branch's position as the staff prepares for the hearing. If the committee encounters resistance from the administration, the legislation's path is more difficult than it might have been, but its success is not impossible.

Administration witnesses are followed by ''public witnesses.'' Some committees hear proponents and opponents on alternating days or half days. Panels are sometimes devised of like-minded or opposing witnesses to make presentations concise and interesting for members.

Witnesses must provide the committee staff with multiple copies of testimony to be presented to the committee at least forty-eight hours before presentation. Having the copies in advance gives the members and their staffs time to study the committee testimony and prepare questions for the witnesses. Copies are also available for the media.

After the witnesses have presented their views, committee members question them. Exchanges are included in the verbatim record of the hearing. The answers, and the questions that elicit them, become part of the legislative history of the bill being considered. For example, if a committee member learns from a witness that the measure would do something radically different from the intended outcome, the member might seek to amend the measure and would state the reasons for the amendment. If that amendment were then signed into law, the amendment's intention could be discerned from the discussion that occurred during the hearing.

Hearings can serve other purposes as well. Most important, they can showcase an issue. An effective technique used by many interest groups is having a celebrity present the group's views before a committee. Celebrities can generate intense media attention for an issue and increase the pressure on legislators to act. Legislators may encourage sensational or poignant testimony to produce increased media attention. Furthermore, hearings can increase a member's visibility, especially important for those interested in pursuing other offices or hoping simply to further their reelection prospects. Finally, members can use hearings as an opportunity to establish their positions on the issues through their statements and questioning of witnesses. These members may be seeking to shore up support from constituents or important interest groups.

Protocol and Procedure for Testifying

* The chairman of the committee may begin with short welcoming remarks and may read an opening statement outlining his or her views on the legislation. The ranking member and other committee members may have opening remarks of their own.

* Each witness leads off with a brief statement for or against the bill in question.

* The chairman then allows each member a brief time to question the witness. The chairman controls the clock.

* The chairman starts the questioning, followed by the ranking member, and then other committee members in order (Democrat, Republican) until everyone has had an opportunity. If there is time left over, the chairman may divide it among those members who have further questions.