joint committee - Committees including membership from both houses of Congress. Joint committees are usually established with narrow jurisdictions and normally lack authority to report legislation. Chairmanship usually alternates between the House and Senate members from Congress to Congress.
Congressional Sessions lists all Congresses and corresponding years - from 1789, when the 1st Congress met, through the current Congress.
You can access legislative information, by bill number or key words, from the THOMAS Web site. Information from the present back to the 93rd Congress (1973) is available on THOMAS.
For information on the Senate, Congress, the legislative process and the federal government, the Virtual Reference Desk is a good place to begin.