Which of the following is included in a law legislative history

"Legislative history" refers to a variety of documents created during the legislative process like bills, hearings, debates, and more. Legislative history is sometimes considered by courts to help determine the intent of the legislature in passing a particular law. Each stage of the legislative process produces particular documents, so it is important to understand the process of enacting a law before diving into the research. See below for an abbreviated discussion on how a bill becomes a law in the federal government and in New York.

Federal Legislative History Overview

The legislative process is complicated and not always this linear, but below is a simplified explanation of how a bill becomes a law:

1. A bill is introduced to either the House of Representatives or the Senate. The bill is given a bill number. Bills from the Senate are designated with an S., and bills from the House are designated with an H.R (for example, 96 H.R. 3343). 

2. The bill is referred to committee, and typically referred again to a subcommittee. If the committee or subcommittee does not favor its passage, it can take no action. 

3. The subcommittee holds hearings and, if it recommends passage, writes a committee report to tell the full chamber of its findings.

4. The bill goes to the full chamber and can be debated and amended before being voted on; floor debates are recorded.

5. If the bill is passed, it goes to the other chamber to be voted on. Often, the two chambers will pass slightly different versions of the same bill. The two versions will then go to a conference committee, which makes compromises to reconcile the differences between the two bills, which will be discussed in a conference committee report. 

6. The passed bill goes to the President to be signed into law. If the President signs the bill (or if the President vetoes the bill and two-thirds of Congress again passes the bill), the bill is now a law and is assigned a public law number (for example, P.L. 96-170). You can find the public law number in the Credits line underneath the text of a statute on Westlaw or the History line underneath the text of a statute on Lexis. 

1. CIS Index to Publications of the United States Congress. 1970-present

This is the single most effective research tool for compiling post-1970 legislative histories. It indexes and abstracts congressional documents, including:

1. hearings
2. committee prints
3. House and Senate reports
4. executive reports
5. treaty documents
6. special congressional publications

Access is by subject, committee, title, bill number, and names of witnesses.

From 1984 to date, three separate volumes (performing separate functions) are published each year: Abstracts, Index, and Legislative Histories. (Prior to 1984, only the Index and Abstracts volumes were published and the legislative histories were included in the back of the Abstracts volume.) In addition, there are four- and five-year cumulative indexes, which are helpful if you are not sure of the precise dates involved.

We have the actual documents indexed in this set on microfiche in the CIS Microfiche Library.

The CIS Index is complimented by Proquest Congressional (may require authentication) which also includes full-text of some legislative documents.

2. Congressional Index1939-present. 

The main function of the CCH Congressional Index is to trace the progress of a bill through the legislative process. This index can be used retrospectively back to 1939, but it is especially valuable for following current legislation, since it is in loose-leaf format and is updated on a weekly basis.

Related bills can be identified and traced by using the subject indexes to find bills on the same topic. If there has been no action on a bill, (i.e., no hearings have been held) then it will not be included in the Status Tables. 

3. CIS US Serial Set Index(1789-1969) 

The documents indexed by this publication are now searchable as part of Proquest Congressional (may require authentication).

The Serial Set is a collection of congressional documents including the following items:

1. House and Senate reports and documents;
2. Senate treaty documents; and
3. Senate executive reports.

This index to the Serial Set provides access to documents in the United States Congressional Serial Set, todocuments in the American State Papers, and to documents preceding the Serial Set (1789-1817).

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