Selected Resources for:
Legislation

Bills  

An introduced bill is the first step in the legislative process. After introduction it is numbered and referred to a committee that has jurisdiction over the subject matter. A bill’s number is unique and is the principal way it is tracked in Congress as it was introduced. At each step in the legislative process, a new version of the bill may be printed and available online. Bills are available online at the THOMAS Library of Congress site beginning with the 101st Congress (1989), in LexisNexis Congressional (1989 forward) and on the GPO Access Congressional Bills site beginning with the 103rd Congress (1993). For a detailed explanation of the federal legislative process, see How Our Laws Are Made from the Library of Congress.

Lauinger Library has selected historical bills on microform from 1979-2000: Senate bills (Y 1.4/1) and House bills (Y 1.4/6).

Century of Lawmaking  

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/

Includes House bills from the 6th through 42nd Congresses and Senate bills from the 16th through 42nd Congresses. Search by bill number, page, date, or committee name.

Hearings  

Hearings on proposed legislation are an opportunity for interested parties to present their views; they are valuable because they provide background information on the issue under consideration. The Government Documents collection on the 1st floor of Lauinger Library has thousands of hearings in print; full-text access is available through GEORGE for newer hearings (generally from the 1990's forward; include 'hearing' as a keyword in your search). Other sources for electronic access to hearings are FDsys (1995-present), LexisNexis Congressional (historical coverage, 19th century forward), the Congressional Hearings page from GPO, and by committee through the Senate and House websites.

Laws and Statutes  

Once an enrolled bill is signed into law by the president, the original enrolled bill is sent from the White House to the Archivist of the United States for publication. It is assigned a public law number and is issued in print as a "slip law." In addition to the law number, the Office of the Federal Register assigns the legal statutory citation of each law and prepares marginal notes, citations, and the legislative history (a brief description of the Congressional action taken on each public bill), which also contains dates of related presidential remarks or statements). OFR publishes the slip laws through the U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO). Therefore, there is a delay from the signed enrolled bill and the availability of the public law. Until then, you can read the full text of the law using the enrolled version of that bill. The text of the enrolled bill will be identical to the public law.

At the end of each session of Congress, the slip laws are compiled into bound volumes called the Statutes at Large, and they are known as "session laws." The Statutes at Large present a chronological arrangement of the laws in the exact order in which they have been enacted.

Every six years, public laws are incorporated into the United States Code, which is a codification of all general and permanent laws of the United States. A supplement to the United States Code is published during each interim year until the next comprehensive volume is published. The U.S. Code is arranged by subject matter, and it shows the present status of laws with amendments already incorporated in the text that have been amended on one or more occasions. Find Public and Private Laws at the GPO Access site beginning with the 104th Congress (1995) or search the Statutes at Large by Public Law number in HeinOnline from 1789 through 2005. Hein also includes the U.S. Code, 1925 through 2006.

Reports  

A committee report usually accompanies a bill as it proceeds to the full chamber for debate and voting. In it will be the text of the bill, discussion, minority views and votes in committee. Nearly all enacted laws will have a report by the House and/or Senate committee(s) that studied the bill. A conference report, issued by a specially appointed conference committee of the House and Senate, is of particular value because it explains the compromise language of the final version of the bill. Conference reports are common for budget and tax bills. See the entry for the Congressional Serial Set for access to congressional reports.

THOMAS  

http://thomas.loc.gov/

Search THOMAS for the full text of legislation for words or phrases or search by bill number. Searching Bill Summary & Status will retrieve information on "sponsor(s); cosponsor(s); official, short and popular titles; floor/executive actions; detailed legislative history; Congressional Record page references; bill summary; committee information; amendment information; subjects (indexing terms assigned to each bill); a link to the full-text versions of the bill; and, if the bill has been enacted into law, a link to the full text of the law on the Government Printing Office Web site. BSS Site.

U.S. Congressional Serial Set  

http://catalog.library.georgetown.edu/search/o?SEARCH=3888071

The U.S. Congressional Serial Set--at last count, over 15,000 volumes--consists of congressional documents and reports. Contents range from the annual Budget of the U.S. Government to impeachment proceedings, annual reports of federal departments and agencies, and even non-governmental publications like the annual report of the Smithsonian Institution.

Lauinger Library has many print volumes of the U.S. Congressional Serial Set (SuDoc Y1.1/2:), albeit irregular holdings from 1909 through 1917 (61st-65th Congresses), then nearly complete from about 1965 (89th Congress) to the most recently received depository distributed volumes. Due to the size of the print collection, the volumes are housed on the 1st floor of Lauinger at the beginning of the regular collection, outside the Government Documents stacks.

GPO Access has a site with some content from the U.S. Congressional Serial Set. Check the LexisNexis Congressional database for full-text access to the Serial Set, 1789-2003 and selected full-text to the present.

United States Statutes at Large  

http://catalog.library.georgetown.edu/search/o?SEARCH=1768474

Lauinger Library has a selection of volumes of the United States Statutes at Large in print and microfiche from 1789 to the most recently received depository volume. Check the catalog record for holdings. HeinOnline has full text coverage of the Statutes at Large from 1789 through 2005, including statutes by Popular Name, Indian Treaties by tribe name, and Other Treaties by country name. If you have an exact citation, e.g. 5 Stat. 449, the Citation Navigator tool will find the electronic version (PDF) of the citation. Another feature is the ability to search by public law number, i.e. P.L. 105-41.

Location: LAU Gov Docs Stx AE 2.111

Congressional Record  

http://www.gpoaccess.gov/crecord/index.html

Floor proceedings of the House and Senate are recorded in the Record. Debates, votes on bills, and text of Senate amendments are usually found only in the Record. Recently material more appropriate to a formal committee report has become available only in the Record, e.g., a bill sponsor’s section-by-section analysis. This is particularly true of “rush” legislation (e.g. the USA PATRIOT Act) or bills of a controversial nature (e.g. a revenue bill). A paperback edition is published every day the House and/or Senate are in session with a permanent hardbound volume replacing the dailies. HeinOnline's U.S. Congressional Documents collection and LexisNexis Congressional have the historical, full text electronic collection.

Location: LAU Gov Docs Stacks X1.1A:

Federal Digital System - FDsys  

http://fdsys.gpo.gov/fdsys/search/home.action

FDsys is a project of the U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO) to provide electronic, digital access to government information. The collection includes the Budget of the U.S. Government; the Compilation of Presidential Documents; Congressional bills, calendars, committee prints, documents, hearings, and reports; the Congressional Record; Economic Indicators; the Federal Register; the List of CFR Sections Affected; and Public and Private Laws. Coverage begins with the 103rd session of Congress (1993) but is not comprehensive. The collection continues to expand to include the most recently digitized documents.

HeinOnline U.S. Congressional Documents  

http://www.heinonline.org/HOL/Index?collection=congrec

This collection, like the Library of Congress Century of Lawmaking site, has historical precursors to the Congressional Record as well as more recent volumes. These include the Annals of Congress, 1st to 18th Congress (1789-1824), Register of Debates, 18th to 25th Congresses (1824-1837), Congressional Globe, 23rd to 42nd Congresses (1833-1873), followed by the Congressional Record (1873 through to the most recent digitized volume).

LexisNexis Congressional  

http://0-web.lexis-nexis.com.library.lausys.georgetown.edu/congcomp

LexisNexis Congressional is the primary source for electronic government documents such as hearings, committee prints, CRS reports, legislative histories, the Congressional Record, federal regulations, and the U.S. Congressional Serial Set. Many documents are in full text and cover the years 1789 to the present; others are citations that are available in full text in print or microform in the library.