A legislature is a kind of deliberative assembly with the power to pass amend and repeal laws.1 The law created by a legislature is called legislation or statutory law. In addition to enacting laws legislatures usually have exclusive authority to raise or lower taxes and adopt the budget and other money bills. Legislatures are known by many names the most common being parliament and congress although these terms also have more specific meanings.

In parliamentary systems of government the legislature is formally supreme and appoints a member from its house as the prime minister which acts as the executive.2 In a presidential system according to the separation of powers doctrine the legislature is considered an independent and coequal branch of government along with both the judiciary and the executive.3

The primary components of a legislature are one or more chambers or houses: assemblies that debate and vote upon bills. A legislature with only one house is called unicameral. A bicameral legislature possesses two separate chambers usually described as an upper house and a lower house which often differ in duties powers and the methods used for the selection of members. Much rarer have been tricameral legislatures; the most recent existed in the waning years of caucasian-minority rule in South Africa.

In most parliamentary systems the lower house is the more powerful house while the upper house is merely a chamber of advice or review. However in presidential systems the powers of the two houses are often similar or equal. In federations it is typical for the upper house to represent the component states; the same applies to the supranational legislature of the European Union. For this purpose the upper house may either contain the delegates of state governments as is the case in the European Union and in Germany and was the case in the United States before 1913 or be elected according to a formula that grants equal representation to states with smaller populations as is the case in Australia and the modern United States.

Because members of legislatures usually sit together in a specific room to deliberate seats in that room may be assigned exclusively to members of the legislature. In parliamentary language the term seat is sometimes used to mean that someone is a member of a legislature. For example saying that a legislature has 100 "seats" means that there are 100 members of the legislature and saying that someone is "contesting a seat" means they are trying to get elected as a member of the legislature. By extension the term seat is often used in less formal contexts to refer to an electoral district itself as for example in the phrases "safe seat" and "marginal seat". See also Politics portal Legislative Assembly Legislative Council List of legislatures by country References "Debate #3 Glossary". Hansard Society. November 2003. http://www.headsup.org.uk/content/default.asppages415. Retrieved 2008-10-16.  "What is the "Westminster System"". Parliament of Victoria. Archived from the original on 2008-07-24. http://web.archive.org/web/20080724133623/http://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/windowintime/faq/showfaq.cfmfaqid22. Retrieved 2008-10-16.  "Governing Systems and Executive-Legislative Relations (Presidential Parliamentary and Hybrid Systems)". United Nations Development Programme. http://www.undp.org/governance/docs/Parl-Pub-govern.htm. Retrieved 2008-10-16.  v d eLaw Core subjects Administrative law  Case law  Constitutional law  Contract  Criminal law  Evidence  Law of obligations  Property law  Public international law  Public law  Restitution  Statutory law  Tort  Trust law Other subjects Admiralty law  Aviation law  Banking law  Bankruptcy  Commercial law  Competition law  Conflict of laws  Consumer protection  Corporate law  Energy law  Entertainment law  Environmental law  Family law  Financial regulation  Human rights  Immigration law  Intellectual property  International criminal law  Labour law  Military law  Music law  Procedure (Civil  Criminal)  Product liability  Space law  Sports law  Tax law  Unjust enrichment  Wills Legal systems Canon law  Civil law  Common law  Comparative law  Halakha  Roman law  Sharia  Socialist law  Statutory law  Xeer Legal theory Critical legal studies  Economic analysis  History  International legal theory  Philosophy  Sociology Legal institutions Bureaucracy  Civil society  Election management body  Executive  Judiciary  Legal profession  Legislature  Military  Police Category  Portal