Law Commons^™

E-Legislating, K.K. Duvivier

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

The United States has been plagued with a deadlocked, “do nothing” Congress for the last several years, but today there is a new game in town. Senator Chris Dodd declared, when he first encountered the full force of e-legislating, “It’s a new day [in Washington]... Brace yourselves.” Digital technologies have fundamentally changed the relationship of citizens to their governments. Since e-democracy was first identified in the 1990s, at least four subcategories have emerged. This article debuts the newest member of the e-democracy family: e-legislating — the use of Internet and social media to influence federal legislation. The federal legislative process …