Federal Legislative History Research

Lake Ellen Wilson, Glacier National Park, Montana; National Park Service.

Legislative history research refers to efforts to track the progress of a bill through the legislative process and to the examination of documents created through that process. The purpose of conducting such research is to ascertain the legislative intent, that is the purpose for the legislation as intended by Congress. In the words of Morris Cohen, Legal Research in a Nutshell, 6th Edition, St. Paul, Minn.: 1996, at 160:

"The ambiguities so common in the language of statutes require lawyers and scholars to locate legislative documents from which they can learn the intended purpose of an act or the meaning of particular statutory language."

The processes that comprise legislative history are, therefore, of two distinct types - determining the meaning or intent of an enacted law and ascertaining the status of a pending bill. The specific tools or components of legislative history consist of the bill and its successive amendments, remarks by the bill's sponsors, floor discussion and debate, committee hearings, committee reports and committee prints.

These documents can be researched at the Department of Interior Library and will involve the researcher in the use of a combination of print, microform, and web-based resources. These sources are discussed and compared below.

HeinOnline's U.S. Federal Legislative History Library is a collection of full-text legislative histories on some of the most important and historically significant legislation of our time. It also includes texts related to legislative histories.

Locating compiled legislative histories

Three print publications offer bibliographies or lists of compiled legislative histories:

Johnson, Nancy P. Sources of compiled legislative histories: a bibliography of government documents, periodical articles, and books, 1st Congress-94th Congress. Littleton, Colo: Published for the American Association of Law Libraries by F.B. Rothman, 1979- KF42.2 1979
Also available on HeinOnline

Reams, Bernard D. Federal Legislative histories: an annotated bibliography and index to officially published sources. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press, c1994.
KF42.2 1994

Union List of Legislative Histories: 1993 supplement updates information through the 102nd Congress, 1992, 6th Edition; Littleton, Colo.: F.B. Rothman & Co., 1993.
KF4 .U55 1993 (Housed in the Law Librarian's Office)

Locating legislative histories from indices and compilations

Several multi-volume library sources provide legislative history documents and/or access points to specific documents. The sets published by the Congressional Information Service (CIS) are more comprehensive than the West Group's United States Code Congressional and Administrative News (USCCAN).

Nevertheless, research in the USCCAN takes less time, involves no research in microforms or other voluminous sets of printed materials, and can provide selected hearings and reports and appropriate citations to discussion in the Congressional Record (housed on Deck Four). Use of the CIS tools can take time and will require the use of microforms and voluminous sets of legislative hearings, prints and reports in order to yield a definitive set of documents to illustrate legislative intent.

CIS Annual. Washington, D.C.: CIS, 1970-
REF KF49 .C62
Includes Index, Abstracts and Legislative Histories, and Four Year Cumulative Index volumes and provides access to CIS microfiche. Microfiche contain committee reports hearings and prints.

CIS U.S. Congressional Committee Prints Index: From the Earliest Publications through 1969. Washington, D.C.: CIS, c1980.
REF Z1223 .Z7 C65 1975

CIS Serial Set Index. Washington, D.C.: CIS, c1975-c1997.
REF Z1223 .Z7 C65 1975
Provides access to congressional documents in print set and microfiche set and includes Index and Carto-bibliography of maps, 1789-1969.

United States Code Congressional and Administrative News. St. Paul, Minn.: West Pub Co., 1944-

LexisNexis Congressional Hearings and Research Digital Collections

The DOI Library now has access to two major digitized collections offered by LexisNexis, the Congressional Hearings Digital Collection, covering congressional hearings dating back to 1824; and the Congressional Research Digital Collection, offering digitized copies of Congressional Research Service (and earlier Legislative Reference Service) reports back to 1916, as well as congressional Committee Prints back to 1830.

The LexisNexis Congressional Hearings Collection is comprised of three modules, all of which are subscribed to by the DOI Library: Retrospective A (years: 1824-1979), Retrospective B (years: 1980-2003) and Prospective (years: 2004 and beyond), totaling close to 125,000 titles. Over 1,500 new hearings are being added annually.

The reports of CRS (1970-present) and the earlier LRS (1916-1969) consist of research reports (from brief summaries to full-length studies) prepared by subject experts for Members of Congress on a wide range of topics - foreign relations, natural resources, Federal case law, Medicare, the environment, national defense, and energy policy, to name but a few.

Committee prints include items such as topical monographic studies; investigative field reports; analyses of bills, including comparisons with existing law; staff memoranda and reports; reports submitted to the committee by Federal agencies; directories, bibliographies, and other reference materials; statistical compilations; complete or partial texts of committee hearings; and preliminary drafts of reports and bills.

U.S. Congressional Serial Set

The U.S. Congressional Serial Set, commonly referred to as the Serial Set, contains the House and Senate Documents and the House and Senate Reports bound by session of Congress. It began publication with the 15th Congress, 1st Session (1817). Documents before 1817 may be found in the American State Papers. In general, it includes: committee reports related to bills and other matters, presidential communications to Congress, treaty materials, certain executive department publications, and certain non-governmental publications.

During much of the 19th century, especially in the pre-Civil War era, the Serial Set included materials originating not only from the U.S. Congress but also key Executive Department publications that were published only or primarily in the U.S. Congressional Serial Set.

The U.S. Congressional Serial Set is now available in a digital version, including maps and plates.

Digitized from the original print volumes in partnerships with leading academic institutions and government organizations, the set features high-resolution full-color digital images, fully searchable OCR-generated ASCII text and full bibliographic metadata for every publication. It is cross-searchable with American State Papers, 1789-1838, which contains every legislative and executive document of the 1st through 14th Congresses.

Using the Internet

The Internet provides several opportunities to access legislative materials. Several useful websites are listed below. Many of these web sites will provide links to other informative sites.

• House of Representatives
• Senate
• THOMAS: Legislative Information on the Internet
• GPO Access: Legislative
• Records of Congress at the National Archives
• Project Vote Smart Includes Congress Track, with Status of Legislation, Appropriation Bills, Week at a Glance, General Information
• C-SPAN Online: Congressional Glossary
• C-SPAN Online: Congressional Vote Search
• C-SPAN Online: Congressional Directory
• C-SPAN Online: Congress Resources
• Congressional Record Index (1983-2006) via GPO Access
• History of Bills (1983-2006) via GPO Access

Tracking a pending bill

In order to track the status of a pending bill, there exists an excellent print tool, which is updated weekly, the CCH Congressional Index (housed at KF49 .C6). This is a looseleaf service which indexes bills by subject and author, maintains biographies on all Federal legislators, lists the members of all committees and subcommittees, summarizes bills and resolutions, describes the voting records on each bill and describes the status of each bill with the dates for each transaction. One can conduct the same research on bill status through THOMAS, the C-SPAN Online sites, and the GPO Access web sites listed above.

This Week in Congress comprises a companion newsletter to the CCH Congressional Index. A double-sided sheet highlights major legislative developments each week.

Quick guide to legislative histories

The following charts describe the best sources for research regarding specific Congressional sessions and for specific steps in the legislative process.

Quick look at the legislative research tools available in the library

Other guides to compiling Federal legislative histories

Federal Legislative History Research: a Practitioner's Guide to Compiling the Documents and Sifting for Legislative Intent  by Richard J. McKinney and Ellen A. Sweet. Published by the Law Librarians' Society of Washington. D.C. Last revised in May 2006.

Electronic Sources for Federal Legislative History Documents with Years/Congresses Available by Richard J. McKinney. Published by the Law Librarians' Society of Washington. D.C. Last revised in November 2006.

The Legislative Process compiled at the Herbert H. Lehman Social Sciences Library, Columbia University