Nonvoting members of Congress

Non-voting members of the United States House of Representatives are Congressional representatives who are not allowed to vote on proposed legislation in the full House but are nevertheless able to participate in certain other House functions. Non-voting members may vote in a House committee of which they are a member and introduce legislation. There are currently six non-voting members: a delegate representing the federal district of Washington D.C., a resident commissioner representing Puerto Rico, and one delegate for each of the other four permanently inhabited US Territories: American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the US Virgin Islands. As with voting members, non-voting delegates are elected every two years, and the Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico is elected every four years.

Non voting members serve exclusively in the House of Representatives—not the Senate. All delegates serve a term of two years, while resident commissioners serve a term of four years. They receive compensation, benefits, and franking privileges (the ability to send outgoing U.S. Mail without a stamp) similar to full House members. Since 1993, the rules governing the rights of a non-voting member have changed three times, and current representatives enjoy rights that they did not have previously.

Territorial delegates existed before the ratification of the United States Constitution. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 allowed for a territory with "five thousand free male inhabitants of full age" to elect a non-voting delegate to the Continental Congress. After the ratification of the Constitution, the first United States Congress reenacted the Ordinance and extended it to include the territories south of the Ohio River.

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