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Compiled Legislative Histories
Legislative histories for major laws are sometimes compiled and published in a single collection. These compilations can be very helpful because they gather all of the legislative sources relating to a law in one place. Therefore, it may be worth your while to determine if one of these exists before attempting to compile the sources on your own.
- Sources of Compiled Legislative Histories (print)Index to compiled legislative histories.
Coverage: 1st Congress (1789-1791) - 108th Congress (2003-2004)
Also available in Hein Online's U.S. Federal Legislative History Library - Federal Legislative Histories: an annotated bibliography and index to officially published sources (print)Finding aid for compilations published by the government.
Coverage: 37th Congress (1862) - 101st Congress, Second Session (1990) - United States Code Congressional and Administrative News (print)USCCAN reprints the United States Statutes at Large along with select congressional reports, signing statements, etc.
Coverage: 77th Congress (1941) - current - ProQuest Legislative Insight (online)Full text congressional publications including the public law, all bill versions, floor debate from the Congressional Record, committee reports, conference committee reports, hearings, and prints.
Offers a very complete legislative history, but only available for enacted legislation. For un-enacted legislation, see PQ Congressional
Coverage: 71st Congress (1929/30) - current - Westlaw (online)Westlaw's U.S. GAO Federal Legislative Histories library is a collection of full text compiled legislative histories in PDF for enacted legislation.
Coverage: 67th Congress (1921/22) - 104th Congress (1995/96) - Hein Online U.S. Federal Legislative History Library (online)Index to and selected full text federal legislative histories in PDF published by the U.S. GPO and private publishers. Also includes the index, "Sources of Compiled Legislative Histories" by Nancy Johnson.
Coverage: 1789 - Current - Legislative Histories of Selected U.S. Laws on the Internet (online)The Law Librarians' Society of Washington, D.C. offers this list of compilations available on the web. See the link to "Commercial Histories" to view compilations available on HeinOnline, Lexis, and Westlaw. Part of LLSDC's Legislative Source Book.
- How Congress Passes Laws (2009-2020 legislative histories)Research project by Law Librarians at Villanova Law reviewing how laws were passed based during the 111th-116th Congresses (2009-20) and the information sources that were generated for each law. Site contains downloadable spreadsheets where you can see data about committees, votes, amendments, reports, and more.