Conference and Committee Reports

GPO Access has recently made available on its website the Conference Reports for the 109th (2005-2006) Congress. A conference report is a compromise on legislation that is negotiated between the House and Senate via conference committees. It is printed and submitted to each chamber for its consideration, such as approval or disapproval. To learn more about Conference Reports, see the About Conference Reports page on the GPO Access website. Links to active (“unofficial”) and archived (“official”) conference reports are provided. Conference reports are available to the public as a filed version prior to official printing. Documents are available in ASCII Text format and Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF).

In addition, GPO Access provides access to Congressional Reports. These reports originate from congressional committees and deal with proposed legislation and issues under investigation. There are two types of reports: House and Senate Reports and Senate Executive Reports. The database for the current Congress is updated irregularly, as electronic versions of the documents become available. Reports are available in ASCII text format and PDF. Use the Congressional Reports Search page for easier searching. Coverage is from the current Congress back to the 104th (1995-96) Congress.

THOMAS, an online directory of legislative resources provided by the Library of Congress, offers a Committee Reports page that provides access to House, Senate, Conference, and Joint Reports. You can browse or search reports from the current Congress back to the 104th Congress. To see a list of all reports, use the browse feature; for each report listed, you will see a House Report number as well as links to Bill Summary and Status and Full Text of Bill (when available). The search feature allows you to search by keyword or report number and limit your search to a particular House or Senate Committee and/or a date range.

A past tip, GPO Access, provides information about additional resources on the GPO Access website. Another tip provides information about THOMAS.