Senate Chamber Desks – Overview". United States Senate. Archived from the original on October 26, 2020 . Retrieved September 2, 2017. Jentleson, Adam (April 12, 2021). "How to Stop the Minority-Rule Doom Loop". The Atlantic . Retrieved February 6, 2023.

Barone, Michael, and Grant Ujifusa, The Almanac of American Politics 1976: The Senators, the Representatives and the Governors: Their Records and Election Results, Their States and Districts (1975); new edition every 2 years Senators serve terms of six years each; the terms are staggered so that approximately one-third of the seats are up for election every two years. This was achieved by dividing the senators of the 1st Congress into thirds (called classes), where the terms of one-third expired after two years, the terms of another third expired after four, and the terms of the last third expired after six years. This arrangement was also followed after the admission of new states into the union. The staggering of terms has been arranged such that both seats from a given state are not contested in the same general election, except when a vacancy is being filled. Class I comprises Senators whose six-year terms are set to expire on January 3, 2025. There is no constitutional limit to the number of terms a senator may serve.Four states – North Dakota, Oregon, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin – do not empower their governors to make temporary appointments, relying exclusively on the required special election provision in the Seventeenth Amendment. [25] :7–8 Article I, Section 3: "The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two senators from each state, chosen by the legislature thereof, for six years; each Senator shall have one vote." First convened in 1789, the Senate of the United States was formed on the example of the ancient Roman Senate. The name is derived from the senatus, Latin for council of elders, derived from senex, meaning old man in Latin. [14] Article Five of the Constitution stipulates that no constitutional amendment may be created to deprive a state of its equal suffrage in the Senate without that state's consent. The United States has had 50 states since 1959, [15] thus the Senate has had 100 senators since 1959. [16] Graph showing historical party control of the U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives, and the Presidency since 1855 [17] America's electoral system gives the Republicans advantages over Democrats". The Economist. ISSN 0013-0613 . Retrieved February 6, 2023. The Congress includes joint committees, which include members from both the Senate and the House of Representatives. Some joint committees oversee independent government bodies; for instance, the Joint Committee on the Library oversees the Library of Congress. Other joint committees serve to make advisory reports; for example, there exists a Joint Committee on Taxation. Bills and nominees are not referred to joint committees. Hence, the power of joint committees is considerably lower than those of standing committees.

Main article: United States congressional committee Committee Room 226 in the Dirksen Senate Office Building, used for hearings by the Senate Judiciary Committee Critics [ who?] contend the Senate's structure gives states with smaller populations the same amount of influence as states with high populations, making the chamber "non-democratic". [75] The disparity in population between the most and least populous states has grown since the 18th century. In 1790, Virginia had approximately ten times the population of Rhode Island, while in 2020, California had approximately 70 times the population of Wyoming. Also, people living in the District of Columbia and in U.S. territories are represented in the Senate by non-voting delegates. [76] [77] One analysis of democracies found that only Argentina and Brazil's upper chambers deviate further from the one person, one vote principle than the U.S. Senate does. [78] Critics, such as Elizabeth Rusch, argue voters from small states have disproportionate influence and benefit from disproportionate amounts of federal funding [79] when compared to voters from larger states. [80] This disparity in representation between large and small states has increasingly favored Republicans since the 1960s, [81] [82] [83] with David Wasserman estimating in 2018 that Democrats would need to keep winning the popular vote by more than 6% to maintain control of the Senate. [84] See also The manner by which the Seventeenth Amendment is enacted varies among the states. A 2018 report breaks this down into the following three broad categories (specific procedures vary among the states): [25] DeLeo, Robert A. (September 17, 2009). "Temporary Appointment of US Senator". Massachusetts Great and General Court. Archived from the original on August 29, 2019 . Retrieved September 28, 2009. Wilson, Woodrow. Congressional Government. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1885; also 15th ed. 1900, repr. by photoreprint, Transaction books, 2002.a b c "US Congress Salaries and Benefits". Usgovinfo.about.com. Archived from the original on January 14, 2021 . Retrieved October 2, 2013. Recess Appointments FAQ" (PDF). US Senate, Congressional Research Service. Archived from the original (PDF) on December 29, 2017 . Retrieved November 20, 2007.