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7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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GOVERNMENT INFORMATION:
LEGISLATIVE HISTORYANDBEYOND
Bridge the Gap
Andrew Winston
March 26, 2013
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I. Federal Legislative History
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What is legislative history?
The documents that are produced inthe process of enacting legislation.
These documents are used to gain insighton the background and events leading toa statutes enactment
Thus potentially giving insight to the intentbehind the statute
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Why do we care?
Legislative histories help whendetermining the intent of the
Congress at the time a statutewas proposed or enacted.
So?
Courts may look to this intent to helpinterpret an ambiguous statute.
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A Not-At-All-Confusing Diagram of theLegislative Process
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Another View
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Legislative Paper Trail
Bills different versions suggest changes as result of
deliberations or compromise
Comm. hearings interested partiesmake statements
Comm. prints background research;staffterm paper
Comm. reports analysis of bill andrecommendation
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Legislative Paper Trail (cont.)
Floor debates not generally informativebut can reflect views of key players
Conference reports the compromisesworked out between the differentchambers highly significant
Enrolled act what is sent to theexecutive
Signing statement or veto statement why the executive acted the way s/he did
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Federal Legislative Materials--Bills
Bills numbered by Congress andby chamber, e.g., H.R. 3055, 94th
Cong. (1976)
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Bills (cont.)
Bills go to committees in both houses, atdifferent times
Bills can go to multiple committees insame house
Committees can receive and amendmultiple bills on same topic
Engrossed bill
official copy of a billthat has passed one chamber
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Citations
Bill Number e.g., H.R. 7152 (88th Cong.)
Public Law Number e.g., P.L. 88-352
Statutes at Large e.g., 23 Stat. 332
U.S. Code Section e.g., 42 U.S.C. 2000a note Popular Name of Act e.g., Civil Rights Act of 1964
Popular Names Table published in United States Code(http://www.heinonline.org/HOL/Page?collection=uscode&handle=hein.uscode/usc2006031&id=271), also a less detailed
version on website of Office of Law Revision Counselhttp://uscode.house.gov/popularnames/popularnames.htm#letterA
http://www.heinonline.org/HOL/Page?collection=uscode&handle=hein.uscode/usc2006031&id=271http://www.heinonline.org/HOL/Page?collection=uscode&handle=hein.uscode/usc2006031&id=271http://uscode.house.gov/popularnames/popularnames.htmhttp://uscode.house.gov/popularnames/popularnames.htmhttp://uscode.house.gov/popularnames/popularnames.htmhttp://uscode.house.gov/popularnames/popularnames.htmhttp://www.heinonline.org/HOL/Page?collection=uscode&handle=hein.uscode/usc2006031&id=271http://www.heinonline.org/HOL/Page?collection=uscode&handle=hein.uscode/usc2006031&id=2717/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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Finding Citations
U.S. Code
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Finding Citations Continued
Statutes at Large
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Finding Citations Continued
Statutes at Large Since 1975, Public Laws printed in Statutes at Large include a partial
legislative history list at the end of each law:
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Committee Papers
Committee prints by committee
Committee hearings can search by witnessor by topic
Committee reports most influential, section-by-section analysis
Compiled inserial set collection of reports andother documents
Committee reports prepared by committee with
subject matter expertise on bill
Conference report compiled by conference comm.(House and Senate)
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Committee Print
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Committee Hearing
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Committee Report
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Congressional Record
Debates on the House & Senate floors
Sometimes includes material not actually saidon the floor
Daily Digest records business of Congress
Indexed by bill number, speaker, topic
Permanent v. Daily editions note that pagenumbers do not match
Use GPO/FDsys to access PDFs
HeinOnline offers access to PDFs as well
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Presidential documents
Enrolled act the final version sentto President
Presidential statements WeeklyCompilation of PresidentialDocuments; Papers of the President
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Signing Statement
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Executive Orders &Proclamations
Executive orders
Directions to agencies
Proclamations
Policy announcements
Frequently ceremonial
Sometimes substantive (e.g., state ofemergency or implementation ofagreements)
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Finding Executive Orders &Proclamations
Numbered sequentially in separate series
Series does not start over with each President
E.g., Proclamation No. 6763, Exec. Order No.11,609
Look for them in Federal Register
Codified in Title 3 of C.F.R.
Title 3 is the only volume of C.F.R. that is keptpermanently
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Finding Executive Orders &Proclamations (cont.)
Compilation of PresidentialDocuments Formerly compiled into Public Papers of the President
Since 1989, you are referred back to Federal Register
Formerly Weekly, now Daily
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/wcomp/index.html
Lexis Westlaw
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/wcomp/index.htmlhttp://www.gpoaccess.gov/wcomp/index.html7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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Presidential Proclamation
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Excerpt from Public Papers of the Presidents of theUnited States (found on FDsys)
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Finding Executive Orders &Proclamations (cont.)
Sometimes reprinted in:
U.S.C.C.A.N. (by year)
U.S. Code, U.S.C.A., U.S.C.S. (byrelated statutory provision)
Statutes at Large (proclamations, but
not executive orders, by year)
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CIS in Paper/Microform
Congressional Information Service 1970-
CIS Indexes/Legislative Histories (inRef.) abstracts of hearings and reports; useful
indexes for finding witnesses, when theytestified, etc.
indexes give microfiche number that youuse to read the original text (generally thisnumber begins with CIS)
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CIS Index in printLists the completelegislative history for agiven actEach type of
document is listed inits own categoryEach document isgiven its own CIS
number to identify itwithin the microfiche
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CIS Listings for Hearings
Hearings are grouped bycommittee so there will beseveral separate sessionsunder one main numberHearings can further be
broken down by thespeakerCIS will list the witnessesthat spoke at each hearing,
in the order they spokeand with their title orassociation, if they haveone
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CIS Online
ProQuest Congressional (formerlyLexis Congressional)
same thing as CIS in paper, but better! can be searched by numerous indexes
provides abstracts in most cases, full-text in some
includes some materials back to 1789 http://congressional.proquest.com/congressio
nal/search/basic/basicsearch
http://congressional.proquest.com/congressional/search/basic/basicsearchhttp://congressional.proquest.com/congressional/search/basic/basicsearchhttp://congressional.proquest.com/congressional/search/basic/basicsearchhttp://congressional.proquest.com/congressional/search/basic/basicsearch7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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Compiled legislative histories
Documents collected, thenrepublished or summarized
Often compiled by law firms orexperts
Indexed: Johnson Sources of Compiled
Legislative Histories Reams Federal Legislative Histories
Hein Online U.S. Federal Legislative
History Library
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FDsys
www.gpo.gov/fdsys
HTML & PDF
Great for retrieval Not-so-good for full-text searching
Bills, hearings, prints, reports,
Congressional Record, Presidentialdocuments
Mostly for relatively currentmaterials
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsyshttp://www.gpo.gov/fdsys7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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Other Online Sources
Westlaw Next > Browse > Legislative History
Westlaw Classic (under U.S. Federal)
Lexis.com (under Federal Legal)
Legislative Sourcebook(http://www.llsdc.org/sourcebook/)
Thomas (http://thomas.loc.gov/) will bereplaced by Congress.gov
(http://beta.congress.gov/) bills
Congressional Record
some committee reports & other info.
http://www.llsdc.org/sourcebook/http://thomas.loc.gov/http://beta.congress.gov/http://beta.congress.gov/http://thomas.loc.gov/http://www.llsdc.org/sourcebook/7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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II. State Legislative History
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State Legislative History
Varies widely from state to state
Search for research guides specific
to legislative history for your state:Example:
Type Florida Legislative History
Research Guide
***You may need to broaden yoursearch to look for state legal researchguides
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Links to Sites for State LegislativeHistory Information
Indiana U. Maurer School of Law:
http://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlibrary/
research/guides/statelegislative/index.shtml
Zimmermans Research Guide onLegislative History
http://law.lexisnexis.com/infopro/zimmermans/disp.aspx?z=1962
http://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlibrary/research/guides/statelegislative/index.shtmlhttp://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlibrary/research/guides/statelegislative/index.shtmlhttp://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlibrary/research/guides/statelegislative/index.shtmlhttp://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlibrary/research/guides/statelegislative/index.shtmlhttp://law.lexisnexis.com/infopro/zimmermans/disp.aspx?z=1962http://law.lexisnexis.com/infopro/zimmermans/disp.aspx?z=1962http://law.lexisnexis.com/infopro/zimmermans/disp.aspx?z=1962http://law.lexisnexis.com/infopro/zimmermans/disp.aspx?z=1962http://law.lexisnexis.com/infopro/zimmermans/disp.aspx?z=1962http://law.lexisnexis.com/infopro/zimmermans/disp.aspx?z=1962http://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlibrary/research/guides/statelegislative/index.shtmlhttp://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlibrary/research/guides/statelegislative/index.shtmlhttp://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlibrary/research/guides/statelegislative/index.shtmlhttp://www.law.indiana.edu/lawlibrary/research/guides/statelegislative/index.shtml7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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In Print
State Legislative Sourcebook
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Virginia Legislative History
Much less to work with
Bills (look for changes in language)
House & Senate documents (may betied to particular legislation)
Bill files (generally closed except by
patrons permission) http://leg1.state.va.us
Legislative Studies
http://leg1.state.va.us/http://leg1.state.va.us/7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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Vi i i L i l i Hi
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Virginia Legislative HistoryContinued
Richmond Sunlight independent website thattracks legislation like the LIS but also allows forpublic comment www.richmondsunlight.com
Senate and House Journals available in print atour library, Library of Virginia
Legislative Reference Center guide to Virginialegislative history research compiled by Virginia
Division of Legislative Services http://dls.state.va.us/lrc/leghist.htm
http://www.richmondsunlight.com/http://dls.state.va.us/lrc/leghist.htmhttp://dls.state.va.us/lrc/leghist.htmhttp://www.richmondsunlight.com/7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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A P ti l St t f
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A Practical Strategy forLegislative History Research
Searching for news articles on legislativedevelopments can provide a quick way topinpoint dates of specific activity, which can then
be used to identify relevant materials inlegislative records.
News articles can sometimes provide legislativebackground that does not make it into the
documents traditionally thought of as legislativehistorybut can be highly relevant.
A P ti l St t
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A Practical StrategyContinued
A public defender was looking for information aboutwhy a 1997 amendment to Va. Code 18.2-67.4,which added ruse to the sexual battery law, wasadopted.
House and Senate journals did not includesubstantive discussion, but they did reveal thesponsor and the date of the amendment.
Searching the Richmond Times-Dispatch using the
name of the sponsor and date uncovered acontemporaneous article discussing a series ofassaults in Charlottesville that prompted theamendment.
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II. Law Library of Congress
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Guide to Law Online
Annotated compilation sources of informationon government and law available online.Includes selected links to useful and reliable
sites for legal information. Portal for hundreds (thousands?) of links to
federal, state, foreign, and internationalresources, including primary sources of
information, as well as academic,governmental, and other commentary.
Available athttp://www.loc.gov/law/help/guide.php.
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III. CRS Reports
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What is CRS?
Sometimes referred to as Congress ThinkTank, the Congressional Research Service, orCRS, is a legislative branch agency within the
Library of Congress. CRS serves members of Congress and their
staffs, providing information, research, experttestimony, and seminars on matters of public
policy, law, legislative procedure, and legislativehistory.
CRS serves only Congress it has no publicmission.
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CRS Areas of Expertise
CRS staff includes hundreds of analysts,attorneys, and information professionals.
Six collaborative research divisions:
American Law
Domestic Social Policy
Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade
Government and Finance Resources, Science, and Industry
Knowledge Services Group
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CRS Reports
From CRS2011 Annual Report:
Reports for Congress, analyses, or studies on specific policy issues ofcongressional legislative interest, are often prepared to address
issues raised in numerous congressional inquiries. Reports clearlydefine issues in legislative contexts. The basic requirements of theseand other CRS written products are relevance, accuracy, objectivity,and nonpartisanship. Analysts define and explain technical terms andconcepts, frame the issues in understandable and timely contexts,and provide appropriate, accurate, and valid quantitative data. Asummary appears on the first page of each report.
Congressional Research Service, Annual Report of theCongressional Research Service of the Library of Congress forFiscal Year 2011 31(2012),http://www.loc.gov/crsinfo/about/crs11_annrpt.pdf
http://www.loc.gov/crsinfo/about/crs11_annrpt.pdfhttp://www.loc.gov/crsinfo/about/crs11_annrpt.pdfhttp://www.loc.gov/crsinfo/about/crs11_annrpt.pdfhttp://www.loc.gov/crsinfo/about/crs11_annrpt.pdf7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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Confidential, however . . .
CRS reports are prepared for members of Congress ona confidential basis. Members of Congress, however,may and do release CRS reports to the public.
Whether CRS reports should be released by CRS
directly to the public remains an ongoing debate.
CRS reports may be obtained from a number of freewebsites and some commercial vendors. Remember,though:
- No way to know whether a purported CRS report,particularly one available for free on the web, isauthentic and unaltered.
- Inactive CRS reports, as well as prior releases ofactive reports, may be out of date.
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Selected Free Sources
University of North Texas Digital Library,http://digital.library.unt.edu/explore/collections/CRSR/
- Basic and advanced search feature
- Can also browse by subject
Open CRS, https://opencrs.com/- Basic search feature
Federation of American Scientists,http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/index.html
- Basic search feature
-Can also browse by a limited number of subject headings
U.S. Department of State, http://fpc.state.gov/c18185.htm
- Can browse by date, world region, and topic
http://digital.library.unt.edu/explore/collections/CRSR/https://opencrs.com/http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/index.htmlhttp://fpc.state.gov/c18185.htmhttp://fpc.state.gov/c18185.htmhttp://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/index.htmlhttps://opencrs.com/http://digital.library.unt.edu/explore/collections/CRSR/7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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Selected Free Sources (contd)
Dudley Knox Library, Naval Postgraduate School,http://libguides.nps.edu/CRS
- Useful LibGuide on finding CRS reports
- List of links to various free repositories of CRS reports
Law Librarians Society of Washington, D.C.,http://www.llsdc.org/crs-congress/
- Compilation of CRS reports on Congress and itsprocedures
- List of links to other free repositories of CRS reports
Penny Hill Press, http://pennyhill.com/- Must pay to access CRS reports from this vendor, but
- Its website includes a browseable list of CRS reports,which can serve as a resource for discovering titles ofreports that might be available through free sites
http://libguides.nps.edu/CRShttp://www.llsdc.org/crs-congress/http://pennyhill.com/http://pennyhill.com/http://www.llsdc.org/crs-congress/http://www.llsdc.org/crs-congress/http://www.llsdc.org/crs-congress/http://libguides.nps.edu/CRS7/28/2019 BTG Government Information Legislative History and Beyond
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Pay Sources
ProQuest Congressional includes CRSreports from 2004-present
Business Insights: Global
CRS reports appear in results of globalsearches
Browseable by month and year from 1999-present
HeinOnline
-CRS reports on taxation from 1978-2009
-CRS reports on bankruptcy from 1984-2009