Federal Legislative History

Congress.gov is the official website for U.S. federal legislative information. It is also free. 

• accurate, timely, and complete legislative information for every bill and resolution since 1973
  • More details on its Scope of Coverage
  • Videos explain Legislative Process
  • Library of Congress (LOC) provides research help, Compiling a Federal Legislative History:  A Beginner's Guide 
  • Glossary of Legislative Terms
• presented by the LOC using data from:
  • the Office of the Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives,
  • the Office of the Secretary of the Senate,
  • the Government Publishing Office,
  • Congressional Budget Office, and
  • the LOC’s Congressional Research Service.

Using advanced search on Congress.gov, you can enter your public law number, and select the relevant congressional session. For example, in the circled area, you could enter "101PL549" (101st Congress, 549th enacted bill) and narrow your search to information from Congressional sessions from 1973 -2022.  This is the Public Law Number for the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. 

You can receive fairly comprehensive results, including a summary, bill text, actions on the bill, amendments to the bill, cosponsors, committees, and references to congressional reports.  

Committee Reports are often seen as the most important document in legislative history. The House, Senate, and Joint Conference Committees can all issue reports, which may analyze the intent of the proposed legislation and the committee's rationale for recommending a bill. 

Committee reports are available on Congress.gov from 1995 (104th Congress) forward. You may search for Committee Reports using the drop down menu available on Congress.gov. 

Free access to historical committee reports requires more effort.  Selected materials appear in Century of Lawmaking (1774-1875). For more information, the Library of Congress has a guide devoted to finding historic Congressional Committee Reports. 

• U.S. Congressional Serial Set, This includes numbered Senate and House Reports, organized by session of Congress. It is offered by govinfo.gov. 
• The HathiTrust offers more historic information on hearings and committee meetings.  U.S. Congressional Serials.