Contacting elected officials
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Contacting elected officials edit (Category edit) Category:Contacting elected officials
Contents |
[edit] Medium/Media [??]
http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Elected.shtml Contact Elected Officials: USA.gov
[edit] E-mail
http://www.eff.org/congress/#e-mail
Presently, most legislators do not fully take e-mail seriously, but you may wish to e-mail them anyway. It can't hurt, and it doesn't take much time. Also, the more used to e-mail that Congress gets, the more seriously the medium will be taken. The White House, by contrast, already treats e-mail with at least some degree of respect and interest.
[edit] capwiz.com
http://www3.capwiz.com/saveinternetradio/mail/compose/?&azip=99324&mailid=custom
Select recipients and desired delivery method for each: [The only option given is "Printed Letter"]
- George W. Bush (R)
- Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA)
- Senator Patty Murray (D-WA)
- Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA 5th)
This Member accepts email only from constituents. If you are not a constituent, your message will be forwarded to your representative.
Unfortunately, they only give you the option to print a letter, not to e-mail, and you have to do the printing and mailing yourself. Lame.
[edit] People/Offices
[edit] Legislators
Finding Your Legislators: Identifying Them
To find out who your US Senators are (you have two - there are two Senators per state), see the Senators-by-State list at http://www.senate.gov/senators/senator_by_state.cfm. You can also look this information up at the Project Vote-Smart Elected Official Biographical Information Database at http://www.vote-smart.org/ce/. The Senate also provides a directory at http://www.senate.gov/contacting/ with fairly complete contact information.
To find out who your US Representative (a.k.a. Congressman/woman) is in the US House of Representatives (you have just one - there is one Rep. per Congressional district, and each state has many districts) see WriteRep at http://www.house.gov/writerep/, which will allow you to look up your legislator by ZIP code and send them a message. You can do likewise with the form at the top of the House member web site lookup page at http://www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.html or with the form below:
http://www.eff.org/congress/#dosdonts
- If you are a constituent, say so. You are a constituent if you are in the US or State Representative's or State Senator's district, or the US Senator's or Governor's state, for example. Legislators pay 10 times more attention to messages from constituents than from non-constituents, because only constituents can vote for (or against) them in the next election!
- If you represent (not the same as "just work for") a corporation or organization, you are better off writing/calling in such a capacity, rather than as a "run of the mill" voter, since legislators tend to perceive organizational communiques as representing a larger set of constituents - or more powerful interests - than individuals' letters/calls, generally speaking. This isn't a particularly pleasant fact, but welcome to the PAC- and lobbyist-infested US political system.
- Refer to legislation (including bills, resolutions and amendments) by number and title. It is also often good to mention the primary sponsor, and the topic of the legislation, as well as whether you think it should be supported or opposed. This can usually be accomplished in one short sentence, e.g. "I am writing to urge you to oppose the "Destroy the Internet Act" (H.R.27189, sponsored by Rep. Yojimbo Doodah), a dangerous piece of unconstitutional censorship legislation." [This is just an example. No such bill exists, though various Net censorship laws are just about as bad.] A good action alert should provide you all of the necessary information to do this, but if it does not, most federal legislation is available (though not always in its most current form) from the Library of Congress legislation Web site, "THOMAS", at http://thomas.loc.gov, searchable by bill number, sponsor, title and keywords. This can be supplemented, at least for House legislation, with information from the House Legislative Processs site at http://www.house.gov/Legproc.html, which provides daily updates on bill amendments and other House action. Some (but less detailed) information on the Senate side is available from the Senate Activities site at http://www.senate.gov/activities/index.html. Many state's legislative Web sites provide similar information (sometimes better, actually) on state bills.
- It is usually a good idea to follow up any letter, fax or e-mail with a phone call.
- Contact legislators regardless of whether or not their known position is in agreement with your own. If they do agree, your contact serves to support them by letting them know their constituents are behind them. If they do not agree, your contact may help change their minds.
- Don't assume that the legislator him/herself will actually read your message. Almost all communications to policymakers are "filtered" through staffers who tally up voters' pro and con opinions on issues. They do this quickly and often simply making assumptions about what you mean if you are not clear.
- Therefore, be very clear about what you mean and what action and/or position you want the legislator to take, and keep it short. It is good to finish your communication with a one-sentence summary that clearly indicates your stance on the issue, what the issue is, and what the legislator should do. E.g., "Please strongly oppose passage of the draconian and anti-democratic "Bill of Rights Repeal Act", S.666, which would strip all Americans of their civil liberties." [Again, this is just an example. But there is some really bad legislation out there.]
[edit] The president
president@whitehouse.gov
or use the interactive web-to-e-mail forms linked off of: http://www.whitehouse.gov/WH/EOP/html/contact_the_whitehouse.html
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/bio/?id=20004&lvl=F
[edit] Why not just contact all your congresspeople?
Why should we only contact the representatives for our district/state?
If we give our opinion to other congresspeople besides "ours", will they even know that we're not a [constituent]? Will they ask? Will they care?
Are we only supposed to contact "our representative"? Why?
Okay, I can sort of see (or at least guess) why...
- May overload the system: Part of the reason that we have "local" representatives representing us in (national) Congress is probably for inefficiency: A single congressperson isn't as able to give adequate/personal to every citizen in the United States; but if the congressperson represents only his/her district, that is a much smaller number of constituents, and he/she can better get to know his/her constituents' needs/desires/opinions and better represent them. I guess that's the theory, anyway...
- Fairness: it doesn't quite seem totally fair to use other districts'/states' representatives when they are not "ours".
I guess my argument would go something like this: But it's a national issue! Of national concern. Affecting all of us, if passed. Shouldn't we have a right, then, to contact, each (all) representative?
Especially those sponsoring a bill we oppose. (As if they'd listen.)
What about Senators? Are we only supposed to contact our representative in the House or do we have a Senator we can/should contact as well?
Another argument might go something like this: What's to stop us? What disincentive exists to dissuade us from contacting each and every representative in our nation? Too much trouble on our part? Mmm, I doubt it -- especially if it's an issue we really care about.
Indeed, if it gets more results (and I don't see how it wouldn't, unless congresspeople totally ignore letters and phone calls from people who are not verified constituents), and I don't see why everyone doesn't do it for the issues they really care about.
Aliases: Contacting policymakers, Contacting your congressperson, Contacting legislators, Contacting your representative, Contacting the president
