Political Science: Congress, Legislation, & the Legislative Process + Data

Statutes are legislation as passed by a governing body. At the United States federal level, this is Congress. Legislators (Congressional representatives and Senators) introduce bills, which may be edited and amended by committees before they are passed. Bills passed by both houses of Congress are then signed into law (or vetoed and do not become law) by the President. Statutes are “the law” as it is written.

A bill is a legislative proposal that if passed by both the Assembly and the Senate and approved by the Governor becomes law. Each bill is assigned a bill number. A denotes bills that originate in the Assembly and S denotes bills that originate in the Senate.

Called "chapters" in California, statutes are the session laws as they were written at the time of passage. (A bill is "chaptered" by the Secretary of State after it has passed through both houses of the Legislature and has been signed by the Governor or becomes law without the Governor's signature.) The Statutes of California is in chronological order as enacted, with no subject arrangement or indication whether a subsequent statute has amended or repealed a prior one.

The Code is the body of law still in force, arranged by subject (eg Health and Safety Code). California Law consists of 29 codes, covering various subject areas, the State Constitution and Statutes. Note: UCSD does not retain previous editions of the California Code

If you have a citation to a law, you can type it directly into the search box in Westlaw. You can also use Nexis Uni, though you may have to also narrow your search with limits.

Inflation Reduction Act (2022) example:

• (Bill) H.R. 5376
• (Slip law) Pub. L.117–169
• (Statute) 136 Stat. 1818

Because these standards are mainly for lawyers who are citing a particular point of law, for statutes and regulations, the best practice is to cite the codified (code) version of the law (e.g., the xx U.S.C. § xxx, xx C.F.R. § xxx, etc.) unless the law is too new to have been codified, distributed across so many codes, no longer valid, being discussed in the context of its passage, or is otherwise impractical to cite this way. For policy research, you are often citing bills or regulations that have been introduced but not passed/finalized/enacted/enrolled, or else you are citing the final version of the legislation or regulation but not the code.

Public and private laws are also known as slip laws. A slip law is an official publication of the law and is competent evidence admissible in all state and Federal courts and tribunals of the United States. Public laws affect society as a whole, while private laws affect an individual, family, or small group. After the President signs a bill into law, it is delivered to the Office of the Federal Register (OFR) at the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) where it is assigned a law number (formatted Pub. L.<Congress session>–<sequential number>), legal statutory citation (public laws only), and prepared for publication. Slip laws get their name because they used to be distributed as loose slips of paper before they were published as bound book volumes in the Statutes at Large. Private laws receive their legal statutory citations when they are published in the United States Statutes at Large.

The final version of United States federal statutes, arranged in the chronological order in which they were passed and signed, is a publication called the The Statutes at Large and citations follow the format <volume number> Stat. <page number>.

All public laws are going to have both a Pub. L. number and a Stat. number and the one you cite indicates the version you are using.

You can research the history and intent of legislation by reviewing a variety of Congressional documents and reports, as well as the introduced bills.

Senate Bills and House Bills

Congressional bills are legislative proposals from the House of Representatives and Senate within the United States Congress. There are six different types of bills.

House bills (H.R.) and Senate bills (S.) require the approval of both chambers (ie House and Senate) and the signature of the President to become law.

House Joint Resolutions (H.J. Res.) and Senate Joint Resolutions (S.J. Res.) require the approval of both chambers and the signature of the President. Joint resolutions generally are used for limited matters, such as a single appropriation for a specific purpose and to propose amendments to the Constitution.

House Concurrent Resolutions (H. Con. Res.) and Senate Concurrent Resolutions (S. Con. Res.) require the approval of both chambers but do not require the signature of the President and do not have the force of law. Concurrent resolutions generally are used to make or amend rules that apply to both chambers.

House Simple Resolutions (H. Res.) and Senate Simple Resolutions (S. Res.) address matters entirely within the prerogative of one chamber or the other. They do not require the approval of the other chamber or the signature of the President, and they do not have the force of law.

There are numerous different bill versions that track a bill through the legislative process from introduction through passage by both chambers (enrolled version). All final published bill versions are available from GPO. 

Codes are the codified version of enacted legislation--they are "the law" arranged by broad subject rather than the sequence in which they were enacted. The United States Code is the codification of the laws of the United States and is published by the Office of the Law Revision Counsel of the U.S. House of Representatives. The U.S. Code was first published in 1926, and each subsequent main edition has been published every six years since 1934. In between editions, annual cumulative supplements are published in order to present the most current information.

Approximately half of the titles have been enacted into positive (statutory) law. When a title of the Code was enacted into positive law, the text of the title became legal evidence of the law. Titles that have not been enacted into positive law are only prima facie evidence of the law, in which case the Statutes at Large remain the official version of the law.

Because these standards are mainly for lawyers who are citing a particular point of law, for statutes and regulations, the best practice is to cite the codified (code) version of the law (e.g., the xx U.S.C. § xxx, xx C.F.R. § xxx, etc.) unless the law is too new to have been codified, distributed across so many codes, no longer valid, being discussed in the context of its passage, or is otherwise impractical to cite this way. For policy research, you are often citing bills or regulations that have been introduced but not passed/finalized/enacted/enrolled, or else you are citing the final version of the legislation or regulation but not the code.

House & Senate Reports & Documents (Serial Set), Hearings, Committee Prints
Congressional Documents types include House Documents, Senate Documents, and Senate Treaty Documents. House and Senate documents contain various kinds of materials ordered to be printed by both chambers of Congress. Documents can include reports of executive departments and agencies, as well as committee prints, that were ordered to be printed as documents. Senate Treaty Documents contain the text of a treaty as it is submitted to the U. S. Senate for ratification by the President of the United States

Congressional reports originate from congressional committees and deal with proposed legislation and issues under investigation. There are two types of reports:

• House and Senate Reports: Reports of congressional committees concerning proposed legislation and/or contain findings on matters under investigation.
• Senate Executive Reports: Reports of the Committee on Foreign Relations relating to treaties between the United States and foreign nations which have been submitted to the U.S. Senate for ratification, or are reports of various Senate committees regarding nomination of individuals.

A hearing is a meeting or session of a Senate, House, joint, or special committee of Congress, usually open to the public, to obtain information and opinions on proposed legislation, conduct an investigation, or evaluate/oversee the activities of a government department or the implementation of a Federal law. In addition, hearings may also be purely exploratory in nature, providing testimony and data about topics of current interest. Most congressional hearings are published two months to two years after they are held.

Congressional Record

The Congressional Record is the official record of the proceedings and debates of the United States Congress. It is published daily when Congress is in session. At the back of each daily issue is the "Daily Digest," which summarizes the day's floor and committee activities.