dean of the United States House of Representatives

{{short description|Longest continuously serving member of the House of Representatives alive}}

{{Infobox political post

|post = Dean

|body = the
United States House of Representatives

|image = File:Hal Rogers, official portrait, 112th Congress (cropped).jpg

|incumbent = Hal Rogers

|incumbentsince = {{start date |2022|3|18}}

|department = United States House of Representatives

|member_of = United States House of Representatives

|seat = Kentucky's 5th

|first = Frederick Muhlenberg
March 4, 1789

}}

The dean of the United States House of Representatives is the longest continuously serving member of the House. The current dean is Hal Rogers, a Republican from Kentucky, who has served in the House since 1981. The dean is a symbolic post, whose only customary duty is to swear in a speaker of the House after the speaker is elected.{{Cite web |url=https://history.house.gov/Institution/Seniority/Deans-Fathers-list/ |title=List at House official site that records the Dean (originally called "Father") and who swore in the Speaker for each Congress |access-date=2019-02-02 |archive-date=2019-02-20 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190220063129/https://history.house.gov/Institution/Seniority/Deans-Fathers-List/ |url-status=live }} This responsibility was first recorded in 1819 but has not been observed continuously – at times, the speaker-elect was the current dean or the speaker-elect preferred to be sworn in by a member of their own party when the dean belonged to another party. The dean comes forward on the House Floor to administer the oath to the speaker-elect, before the new speaker then administers the oath to the other members.{{cite web|url=http://history.house.gov/Institution/Origins-Development/Oath-of-Office/|title=Oath of Office - US House of Representatives: History, Art & Archives|website=History.house.gov|access-date=1 January 2018|archive-date=28 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210428134342/https://history.house.gov/Institution/Origins-Development/Oath-of-Office/|url-status=live}}

While deans perform the swearing-in ceremony for the newly elected speaker, they do not preside over the election of a speaker, as do the Father of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom and the dean of the Canadian House of Commons (that duty falls to the previous House's Clerk).

Because of other privileges associated with seniority, the dean is usually allotted some of the most desirable office space, and is generally either chair or ranking minority member of an influential committee.

It is unclear when the position first achieved concrete recognition, though the seniority system and increasing lengths of service emerged in the early 20th century. As late as 1924, Frederick H. Gillett was dean, and also speaker, before becoming a senator. Modern deans move into their positions so late in their careers that a move to the Senate is highly unlikely. When Ed Markey broke Gillett's record for time in the House before moving to the Senate in 2013 he was still decades junior to the sitting dean.

The deanship can change hands unexpectedly. In the 1952 election, Adolph J. Sabath became the first Representative elected to a 24th term, breaking the record of 23 terms first set by former Speaker Joseph Gurney Cannon, whose service had been non-consecutive, whereas Sabath's was not. North Carolina's Robert L. Doughton had not contested that election as he was retiring at the age of 89 years and two months, a House age record broken in 1998 by Sidney R. Yates, and again by Ralph Hall in 2012. However, Sabath died before the new term began and Doughton was dean for the old term's final months before Speaker Sam Rayburn became dean in the new Congress.

List of deans of the House

Years as dean are followed by name, party, state, and start of service in Congress.

All the members of the First Congress had equal seniority (as defined for the purpose of this article), but Muhlenberg, as the speaker, was the first member to be sworn in. Muhlenberg, Hartley and Thatcher were among the 13 members who attended the initial meeting of the House on March 4, 1789.

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, some state delegations to the House were often not elected until after the term had begun. To avoid confusion, this fact is ignored in the list below.

class="wikitable sortable"

!Became dean

!End date

!colspan=2|Dean

!Party

!State

!Seniority from

!Speaker(s)

rowspan=4 |{{sort|1789-03-04|March 4, 1789}}

|rowspan=4 |{{sort|1797-03-03|March 3, 1797}}

|rowspan=4 |60px

|rowspan=4 |{{sortname|Frederick|Muhlenberg}}{{efn-ua|Served as Speaker 1789–1791 and 1793–1795.}}

|rowspan=4 {{Party shading/Federalist}} |Federalist

|rowspan=4 |PA

|rowspan=7 |{{sort|1789-03-04|March 4, 1789}}

|{{Party shading/Federalist}} |{{sortname|Frederick|Muhlenberg}}
(1789–1791)

{{Party shading/Federalist}} |Jonathan Trumbull Jr.
(1791–1793)

{{Party shading/Democratic-Republican}} |{{sortname|Frederick|Muhlenberg}}
(1793–1795)

rowspan=2 {{Party shading/Federalist}} |Jonathan Dayton
(1795–1799)

rowspan=3 |{{sort|1797-03-04|March 4, 1797}}

|rowspan=2 |{{sort|1800-12-21|December 21, 1800}}

|rowspan=2 |60px

|rowspan=2 |{{sortname|Thomas|Hartley}}{{efn-ua|Died in office.|name=died}}{{efn-ua|Never held sole deanship due to tie.|name=tie}}

|rowspan=2 {{Party shading/Federalist}} |Federalist

|rowspan=2 |PA

rowspan=2 {{Party shading/Federalist}} |Theodore Sedgwick
(1799–1801)

dean of the United States House of Representatives

List of deans of the House

See also

References

Notes

External links