Federal Legislative History Guide

Congress produces a variety of publications as a bill moves through the legislative process on its way to becoming a law. A compilation of these full text primary source publications produces a legislative history that is valuable to a wide variety of researchers. Legislative Insight offers a research citation page that not only links to the full text of the associated primary source publications¸ but allows users to do a Search Within from that very page that searches the full text of all the associated publications with one-click. Full-text publication types associated with a legislative history include the Public Law¸ all versions of enacted and related bills¸ Congressional Record excerpts¸ and committee hearings¸ reports¸ and documents.

Provides daily updated information¸ including full text of bills starting in 1989¸ public laws starting in 1988¸ committee reports starting in 1990¸ House and Senate documents starting in 1995¸ Congressional hearings starting in 1987-88¸ Congressional Record starting in 1985¸ Federal Register starting in 1980¸ National Journal starting in 1977 and other government information. Users can search an index of congressional publications from 1970 to the present¸ retrieve CIS Legislative Histories for public laws going back to 1970¸ find testimony from congressional hearings¸ track bills as they move through the House and Senate¸ search the Congressional Record and Federal Register¸ locate information about members and committees¸ and search the National Journal.

The U.S. Federal Legislative History Library provides a variety of complied legislative histories and also includes the database "Sources of Compiled Legislative Histories".

Westlaw is a legal database restricted to law faculty, staff and students.

Lexis Advance is a legal database restricted to law faculty, staff and students.