Announcing the Release of the 2019-2022 Maryland and Alabama State Legislatures State Legislative Effectiveness Scores (SLES) The Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) is proud to announce the release of our State Legislative Effectiveness Scores (SLES) for the 2019-2022 Maryland and Alabama legislative sessions. This initiative is part of our broader effort to measure the lawmaking effectiveness of individual legislators in all 99 state legislative chambers in the United States.These scores capture lawmaking effectiveness by tracking the number of bills legislators sponsor, how far those bills advance through the legislative process,…

Legislative Effectiveness and Informal Institutions: Evidence from Latin America Tuesday, January 6, 2026 In fragmented presidential systems, there is discussion about why some legislators are more effective than others. In an article published in Latin American Politics and Society, Beatriz Rey examines Brazil’s highly fractionalized party system to understand how lawmakers advance legislation when parties fail to provide sufficient coordination. The study argues that legislative member organizations (LMOs) supply policy expertise and political information that parties often lack, enabling legislators to sponsor and shepherd bills more effectively. Rey tests this argument…

2025: A Year in Review As 2025 draws to a close, we at the Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) wanted to take the time to reflect on our accomplishments this year. These included, but were not limited, to the following:Updating our Legislative Effectiveness Scores for the 118th Congress (including for issue areas) and sharing our congressional New Member Guide with every newly elected member of the House and Senate, as well as at regularly held briefings and sessions with congressional staff.Announcing the release of our State Legislative Effectiveness Scores, with…

(l-r) Kevin Kosar, Molly Reynolds, Danielle Thomsen, and Daniel Stid. The Money Signal—How Fundraising Matters in American Politics Thursday, December 11, 2025On Thursday, December 4, 2025, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) held a panel discussion to mark the publication of a book written by Danielle M. Thomsen, Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Irvine and Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) faculty affiliate and advisory board member. Titled “The Money Signal—How Fundraising Matters in American Politics,” the book examines how congressional fundraising has changed over the years and…

Center for Effective Lawmaking 2025 Annual Report The Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) is celebrating another successful year with the release of our annual report. Founded in 2017 as a joint venture between the University of Virginia’s Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy and Vanderbilt University, the Center’s trusted methodology and analyses have been cited in hundreds of news articles and widely used by lawmakers and their staffs, scholars, and many others around the country who care about effective lawmaking.Highlights over the last year include:Updating our Legislative Effectiveness…

2025-2026 Small Grant Awards Announced Thursday, November 13, 2025The Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) is proud to present its 8th annual small grant awards and recipients. The awards are given to scholars who are researching topics that connect to the mission of the CEL to advance the generation, communication, and use of new knowledge about the effectiveness of individual lawmakers and legislative institutions. This group of scholars will join previous grant recipients who have made insightful contributions to the study of lawmaking effectiveness. We are honored to support the awardees and look…

Meet our Faculty Affiliate: Melanie Egorin Thursday, November 6, 2025 The Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) is pleased to welcome one of our newest faculty affiliates, Melanie Egorin.Melanie Anne Egorin is a professor of practice in public policy at the University of Virginia Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy. A nationally recognized strategic and innovative health policy expert with over 25 years of experience, Dr. Egorin served most recently as assistant secretary for legislation at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), where she was confirmed by…

CEL at APSA 2025 Tuesday, October 21, 2025Between September 11-14, the Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) attended the annual American Political Science Association (APSA) conference in Vancouver, Canada titled “Reimagining Politics, Power, and Peoplehood in Crisis Times”. The event allowed for more than 5,000 political scientists, scholars, and experts across the discipline to participate and showcase their works to the broader audience, with panels and presentations that included the following from CEL affiliates (and others):Accountability in Darkness: The Effects of Local Media Closures on Legislators - Kisoo Kim (University of…

The (Sometimes Untraceable) Origins of Policy Ideas in Congress: An Analysis of Seven Landmark Laws Research on lawmaking suggests legislative enactments are constructed in various ways. Although multiple approaches are documented in the literature, political scientists do not conclusively know which are used more often. In this paper published in Legislative Studies Quarterly - which was supported by a small grant award from the Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL)  - Jeremy Gelman, Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Nevada, Reno, examines how laws are created by studying…

CEL on CNN's Smerconish Monday, September 29, 2025Center for Effective Lawmaking (CEL) Co-Director Alan Wiseman of Vanderbilt University was a guest on CNN's Smerconish to discuss the published paper “On the Decline of Elite-Educated Republicans in Congress” and the educational divide in American politics. Professor Wiseman coauthored the paper with CEL Co-Director Craig Volden of the Frank Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy at the University of Virginia and Associate Professor Jonathan Wai of the University of Arkansas, and it was published in the academic journal Perspectives on Politics.In the segment, Professor…