Earlier this month, Andrew brought us news that the Bound Congressional Record on Congress.gov now provides coverage dating back to 1881. With this release, we are adding enhancements to our historical collection of bills, joint resolutions, and historical documents that was migrated to Congress.gov from the Library of Congress Century of Lawmaking site.
Bills and joint resolutions from this collection are now labeled as Historical Bill Text on Congress.gov. There are some important differences to note in the display of historical bills on Congress.gov.
- Historical bill and document texts predate authenticated digital publishing. Only the bill texts from 1799 (6th Congress) to 1809 (10th Congress) are searchable. For the rest of the collection, only the title and a minimal amount of metadata are searchable.
- You can also choose to browse this collection.
- Please note that bills from 1799 (6th Congress) to 1817 (14th Congress) were not numbered and appear as such on Congress.gov. That means that there is not an authoritative bill number associated with these bills and the number that appears in the URL is not a bill number.
- The tabs that are displayed for this collection include Text, Actions, Similar Bills, and, if the data is available, Committees. Similar Bills is a machine-generated list that is based on matching words in bill titles. Learn more about the Similar Bills Tool at About Related Bills.
Enhancements
Enhancement – Historical Bill Text
- The Historical Bill Text label denotes bill and document text that predates authenticated digital publishing.
- Use the Historical checkbox on the legislation search form to search bill texts from the 6th through 10th Congresses (1799-1809) or bill titles and metadata from the 11th Congress and 13th through 42nd Congresses (1809-1811, 1813-1873).
- Bills from the 6th Congress (1799) to 1817 (14th Congress) were not numbered but use a unique identifying number in the URL.
- Historical bill text items also include tabs for Actions, Similar Bills, and Committees, as available. Similar Bills is a machine-generated list based on matching words in bill titles. Learn more about the Similar Bills Tool at About Related Bills.
Congress.gov Tip
Congress.gov makes it easy to keep up with committee activity via the House and Senate Committee Schedule. You can also sign up to receive a weekly email alert each Monday that will provide the projected committee schedule for the coming week. Just click “Get Weekly Alerts” at the top of the page.
Most-Viewed Bills
The following are the most-viewed bills for the week of April 16, 2023.
| 1. | S.686 [118th] | RESTRICT Act |
| 2. | H.J.Res.7 [118th] | Relating to a national emergency declared by the President on March 13, 2020. |
| 3. | H.R.25 [118th] | FairTax Act of 2023 |
| 4. | H.R.2435 [118th] | Gold Standard Restoration Act |
| 5. | H.R.2617 [117th] | Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023 |
| 6. | S.596 [117th] | Treat and Reduce Obesity Act of 2021 |
| 7. | H.R.5376 [117th] | Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 |
| 8. | H.R.185 [118th] | To terminate the requirement imposed by the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for proof of COVID-19 vaccination for foreign travelers, and for other purposes. |
| 9. | H.R.82 [118th] | Social Security Fairness Act of 2023 |
| 10. | H.R.1 [118th] | Lower Energy Costs Act |
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