Most, but not all, Congressional documents are available in a citable form through the various online, microform (located on the 3rd floor), and hard-copy resources of the Law Library.
The majority of recent (1995 - present) publications can be obtained full-text in pdf, citable form from the GovInfo website. Please note that very recent material may not be available yet. The Congress.gov website is a very useful index to Congressional material from 1989 to the present, and can be used to help identify a congressional document prior to retrieving it on the GovInfo website.
The Law Library subscribes to ProQuest Congressional, a database that indexes Congressional material dating back to the 1st Congress (1789). ProQuest Congressional also provides access to full text, pdf, citable versions of certain Congressional documents.
HeinOnline has recently released the U.S. Congressional Serial Set in full-text digital form. While this is an ongoing project, there is already a vast amount of Congressional documents including House and Senate reports, House and Senate documents, and a variety of other papers ordered by Congress. Coverage includes 1817-date.
HeinOnline contains digitized and searchable full-text collections of legal journals, texts, cases, statutes, regulations, agency decisions, Congressional documents, legislative histories and treaties, covering U.S. federal and state, U.K, Canada and international law. Majors subsets include: U.S. Code, Statutes at Large, Congressional Record, CFR, Federal Register, state statutes and reports (historical), state session laws (current), Attorney General's opinions, and selected CRS reports and Congressional hearings.
Provides access to Legislative Histories (1969-present); Congressional Reports (1817-present); Congressional Hearings (published and unpublished) (1824-present); U.S. Congressional Serial Set and American State Papers from 1789-1969; and CRS Reports (1916-present). Also contains member biographies, committee assignments, voting records, and financial data
The table below provides a simplistic overview of the available sources for citable versions of select Congressional documents. This table does NOT represent all Congressional material available through the Law Library, nor does it account for variations in coverage between sessions of Congress.
|
|
HeinOnline |
ProQuest Congressional |
GovInfo |
|
Committee Reports |
1817-Present |
1789-1969 |
1995-Present |
|
Committee Hearings |
Varies |
1980-Varies |
1995-Present |
|
Committee Prints |
X |
X |
1997-Present |
|
Congressional Record |
1873-Present |
X |
1994-Present |
|
Congressional Bills |
X |
1989-Present |
1993-Present |
The following library guides provide additional information which may be helpful when researching Congressional information.