United States House Committee on Appropriations

Committee information

  • Date created: March 2, 1865
  • Members: Sixty-one members in the 119th Congress (2025-2027)
  • Subcommittees: Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies; Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies; Defense; Energy and Water Development, and Related Agencies; Financial Services and General Government; Homeland Security; Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies; Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies; Legislative Branch; Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies; National Security, Department of State, and Related Programs; Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies

Role

The United States House Committee on Appropriations is a legislative committee tasked with overseeing the federal spending of the United States. The committee, along with its counterpart in the US Senate, is responsible for reviewing and drafting appropriations bills that provide funding for most government agencies and programs. As a result, it is one of the most powerful committees in Congress, and its members are considered to be highly influential. The committee receives its power to legislate federal spending directly from the US Constitution. It is one of the largest in membership in the House and is the largest by number of subcommittees. The twelve subcommittees of the Appropriations Committee are each responsible for a segment of the budget under their jurisdiction.

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The US Congress divides the responsibility for investigating and drafting legislation among committees in the House and Senate. Each committee is granted jurisdiction over a specific issue or segment of the federal government. During the 119th Congress (2025-2027), the House had twenty permanent committees and the Senate had sixteen. Permanent committees are also known as standing committees, and have full legislative authority to consider bills and recommend them to the floor of the House or Senate for a vote. Temporary committees, called select committees, are created by a resolution of the House or Senate. Select committees typically conduct investigations and hold hearings on issues that fall outside of an existing standing committee’s jurisdiction. Select committees must be renewed to continue after their mandate expires. Some select committees have been made into standing committees through congressional legislation.

All House and Senate committees are subdivided into smaller subcommittees to handle even more specific aspects of federal business. During the 119th Congress, the House and Senate combined had more than two hundred committees and subcommittees. Normally, House rules limit the number of subcommittees to five per committee. The rules do allow an exception for the addition of an oversight subcommittee to function in a supervisory capacity. However, to handle a federal budget that is measured in trillions of dollars, the House Committee on Appropriations is allowed to have twelve subcommittees. The House Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees are also exceptions to the rule, and have the second most subcommittees with seven each. The Senate does not restrict the number of subcommittees.

The House Committee on Appropriations plays a major role in the annual process of creating a federal budget. The legislative part of the process begins when the president submits his budget proposal to Congress. By law, this must be done by the first week of February, although new administrations are typically granted extra time. The proposal outlines the president’s funding requests for the programs and agencies of the federal government. After examining the proposal, the House and Senate adopt a combined budget resolution as a guideline for spending levels. Both the House and Senate Committees on Appropriations then take up the budget, with each subcommittee in each chamber working on crafting an appropriations bill for the agencies under its jurisdiction. The subcommittees hear testimony from representatives of these agencies laying out their case as to why they need the requested money.

After the hearings are complete, each subcommittee decides how much the agencies in its charge receive and drafts an appropriations bill. Each subcommittee then submits its bill to the full Committee on Appropriations. The committee considers each of the twelve subcommittees’ bills separately before sending them to the full House or Senate for a floor vote. Typically, the House Committee on Appropriations finishes this work by May or June. Senate bills are usually submitted a month or two after the House. The House and Senate debate the bills for several months. When the measures pass both the House and Senate, members of both chambers negotiate changes between the two versions before deciding on a final bill. Once that process is complete, the bill goes to the president for his signature.

History

The power to decide federal spending was specifically granted to Congress by the Constitution. Article I, Section 9 states that, “No money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in consequence of the appropriations made by law.” Since Congress is the only body with the authority to make laws, this placed that duty squarely in its hands. Congress has decided federal spending since the first Congress in 1789. However, the task was then the responsibility of the House Ways and Means Committee, which also handled the nation’s tax policies.

In the years before the Civil War (1861–1865), federal spending averaged about $60 million annually. However, after the outbreak of fighting, that amount ballooned to more than $1.3 billion by 1865. To handle the growing responsibility, the House split the duties of the Ways and Means Committee and gave the task of handling federal spending to the newly created House Appropriations Committee on March 2, 1865. The first committee consisted of nine members and was led by Pennsylvania Republican Thaddeus Stevens. The committee worked on ten appropriations bills totaling $357 million.

Starting in the late nineteenth century, some individual House committees began authorizing their own spending measures. During this time, federal spending began to skyrocket, ultimately hitting $18.5 billion by 1919. A year later, Congress placed responsibility for federal spending solely under the control of the Committee on Appropriations and expanded the committee’s membership. In 1921, Congress passed a law requiring the president to submit a budget request to Congress for the first time. New legislation in 1974 required the House and Senate to pass a budget resolution and created standing budget committees in the House and Senate to work on that legislation.

Subcommittees

The House Committee on Appropriations consisted of fifty-two members during the 115th Congress. The party affiliation of a committee is determined by the ratio of the two parties in the full House. The committee chair is always a member of the majority party, while a member of the minority party is appointed as the ranking member. At the start of the 116th Congress in 2019, Democrat Nita Lowey was named chair of the committee, and Republican Kay Granger was named ranking member. The appointments marked the first time two women led a standing committee in the House. During the 119th Congress, the committee's chair was Republican Tom Cole, and the ranking member was Democrat Rosa DeLauro.

The number of subcommittees and committee members can change with each session of Congress. The last change in the House Committee on Appropriations occurred in 2007 when the number of subcommittees was increased from ten to twelve.

This subcommittee is responsible for the agricultural-related aspects of the federal government. Its jurisdiction includes the Farm Credit Administration, Farm Credit System Financial Assistance Corporation, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. It also includes the Food and Drug Administration—the federal agency responsible for food safety and protecting public health—and most divisions of the Department of Agriculture except for the Forest Service. The subcommittee had fifteen members in the 119th Congress.

This subcommittee oversees spending for the Departments of Justice and Commerce, the National Science Foundation, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the federal agency responsible for the nation’s space program. The subcommittee also oversees several other agencies, including the Commission on Civil Rights, Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and the International Trade Commission. As of the 119th Congress, the subcommittee had thirteen members.

United States House Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense

This subcommittee handles spending related to the US military and the intelligence community. The Departments of the Army, Navy, and Air Force fall under its jurisdiction. It oversees the budget requests for the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Military Health System, and a number of other defense agencies. The subcommittee is also responsible for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)—the nation’s primary foreign intelligence–gathering agency. The subcommittee had seventeen members in the 119th Congress.

This subcommittee is responsible for the Department of Energy and the civilian aspects of the Department of Defense, the Department of the Army, and the Army Corps of Engineers. It also oversees the Department of the Interior and the Bureau of Reclamation—an agency tasked with water resource management. Other agencies under its jurisdiction include regional environmental and resource management projects such as the Central Utah Project, the Appalachian Regional Commission, and the Tennessee Valley Authority. As of the 119th Congress, the subcommittee had fifteen members.

United States House Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government

This subcommittee manages spending for a wide range of federal offices and agencies. Among its primary responsibilities are expenditures related to the Executive Office of the President. These include presidential compensation expenses and maintaining the offices, residence, staff, and repair of the White House. The subcommittee is also responsible for the Department of the Treasury, the federal judiciary, and the District of Columbia, the capital district of the United States. The subcommittee had thirteen members in the 119th Congress.

United States House Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security

This subcommittee oversees spending for the Department of Homeland Security. The department was created in 2002 in the wake of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. Among the agencies under the department’s jurisdiction are the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Transportation Security Administration, the Coast Guard, and the Secret Service. The subcommittee had eleven members during the 119th Congress.

This subcommittee is primarily responsible for agencies and programs related to the Department of the Interior—the department tasked with the management and conservation of federal lands. It oversees the Environmental Protection Agency, an agency that has cabinet-level rank. Among the other agencies under the subcommittee’s jurisdiction are the US Forest Service, the Indian Health Service, the National Gallery of Art, and the Smithsonian Institution. The subcommittee had eleven members in the 119th Congress.

This subcommittee has jurisdiction over the Department of Education, the Department of Labor, and most aspects of the Department of Health and Human Services. Among the many other agencies it manages are the Social Security Administration, the National Labor Relations Board, the National Council on Disability, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. During the 119th Congress, the subcommittee had seventeen members.

This subcommittee handles aspects of the Department of Defense related to military construction. This includes the construction and operation of housing for military members and their families, military base realignment, and the homeowners’ assistance fund. The subcommittee is also responsible for the Department of Veterans Affairs, which manages health care, disability, and other benefits for military veterans. The subcommittee had thirteen members in the 119th Congress.

United States House Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch

This subcommittee manages the expenditures of the House of Representatives. This includes funding for the Congressional Budget Office, Library of Congress, Government Accountability Office, Capitol Police, and US Botanic Garden. The subcommittee had eight members in the 119th Congress.

This subcommittee is responsible for the Department of State and aspects of the Department of the Treasury relating to international financial institutions and international technical assistance. It also oversees several agencies related to exports and trade. Other programs and agencies under its jurisdiction are the African Development Foundation, the US Institute of Peace, the International Fisheries Commissions, and the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe. As of the 119th Congress, the subcommittee had eleven members.

This subcommittee is primarily responsible for the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Transportation. Also included under its jurisdiction are the US Interagency Council on Homelessness, the Federal Maritime Commission, and the National Transportation Safety Board—an agency tasked with investigating highway, railway, aviation, and other transportation-related accidents and safety issues. The subcommittee had fifteen members in the 119th Congress.

Bibliography

“About.” House Committee on Appropriations, appropriations.house.gov/about. Accessed 11 Feb. 2025.

Heitshusen, Valerie. “Committee Types and Roles.” Congressional Research Service, 2 May 2017, crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/RS/98-241. Accessed 11 Feb. 2025.

“House Committees.” United States House of Representatives, www.house.gov/committees. Accessed 11 Feb. 2025.

Saturno, James V., et al. “The Congressional Appropriations Process: An Introduction.” Congressional Research Service, 30 Nov. 2016, www.senate.gov/CRSpubs/8013e37d-4a09-46f0-b1e2-c14915d498a6.pdf. Accessed 11 Feb. 2025.

Spieler, Matthew. The U.S. House of Representatives: Fundamentals of American Government. Thomas Dunne Books, 2015.

“Subcommittees.” House Committee on Appropriations, appropriations.house.gov/subcommittees. Accessed 11 Feb. 2025.

“The Transformation of the Committee on Appropriations.” United States House of Representatives, history.house.gov/HistoricalHighlight/Detail/15032398311. Accessed 11 Feb. 2025.

Werner, Erica. “Two Women to Lead Powerful House Appropriations Committee, a First for Congress.” Washington Post, 29 Nov. 2018, www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/two-women-set-to-lead-powerful-house-appropriations-committee-a-first-for-congress/2018/11/29/e5c57370-f419-11e8-aeea-b85fd44449f5‗story.html?utm‗term=.676404d0a47c. Accessed 11 Feb. 2025.