btg legislative history

8/2/2019 BTG Legislative History

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Legislative History

Bridge the GapHeather Casey

April 2, 2012


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What is a 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 giving insight to the intent behind thestatute


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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 when astatute is ambiguous on its face.


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A Not-At-All-Confusing Diagram of theLegislative Process


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A Simpler Diagram

This chart was found on the Notre Dame Law Library website at:http://law.nd.edu/library-and-technology/students/legal-research-guides/federal-legislative-history-research


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Legislative Paper Trail

Bills different versions suggest changes as result of

deliberations or compromise

Comm. hearings interested parties makestatements

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 she 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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Committee Papers

Committee prints by committee

Committee hearings can search bywitness or by topic

Committee reports most influential,section-by-section analysis

Serial setcollection of reports and other

documents 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 said on the floor Daily Digest records business of

Congress

Indexed by bill number, speaker, topic

Permanent v. Daily editions pagenumbers do not match

Use GPO/FDSys to access PDFs

Hein Online 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.html


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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://law.richmond.edu/library/databases.ht

ml (Look under Federal Resources)
http://law.richmond.edu/library/databases.htmlhttp://law.richmond.edu/library/databases.htmlhttp://law.richmond.edu/library/databases.htmlhttp://law.richmond.edu/library/databases.html


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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, Presidentialdocs

Mostly for current materials
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsyshttp://www.gpo.gov/fdsys


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Other Online Sources

Lexis (under Federal Legal)

Westlaw (under U.S. Federal)

Legislative Sourcebook(http://www.llsdc.org/sourcebook/)

Thomas (thomas.loc.gov)

bills

Congressional Record

some committee reports & other info.
http://www.llsdc.org/sourcebook/http://www.llsdc.org/sourcebook/


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State Legislative Histories

Varies wildly 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 looking for state legal researchguides


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Links to Sites for State Leg.Hist. 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.shtml


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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/


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Virginia Legislative HistoryContinued

Richmond Sunlight independentwebsite that tracks legislation like

the LIS but also allows for publiccomment www.richmondsunlight.com

Senate and House Journals available in print at our library,Library of Virginia
http://www.richmondsunlight.com/http://www.richmondsunlight.com/


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And finally.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=fZi4JxbTwPo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=fZi4JxbTwPohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=fZi4JxbTwPohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=fZi4JxbTwPohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=fZi4JxbTwPo