Relation uf the Federal Government to Research 



123 



ences to prior or existing legislation, citations of judi- 

 cial decisions, when the constitutional right to act is 

 in queston, and analyses of the testimony of witnesses 

 at the public hearings. Especially valuable are the 

 reports of the Senate and House Conunittees on the 

 Judiciary on matters involving constitutional limita- 

 tions and the organization and procedure of the judi- 

 cial branch, and the Senate Committee on Foreign 

 Relations on matters pertaining to foreign affairs. In 

 1901, the latter committee caused to be reprinted in 8 

 volumes a compilation of its reports made during the 

 period 1789-1901. 



The printed committee repcn-ts arc published as a 

 separate series of congressional documents under the 

 titles Senate Reports and House Reports. Only the 

 leporis of conference committees are printed in fidl 

 in the Congressimial Record. In the earlier Con- 

 gresses, committee reports were not segregated and 

 jninted as a separate series and it was consequently 

 not always an easy matter to locate a desired report. 

 To remedy this. Congress, by Joint Resolution of July 

 29, 1886, directed the assembling of all committee 

 reports for the period 1815 to 1887, or the Fourteenth 

 Congress to the Forty-ninth Congress. This work was 

 performed by T. H. McKee, Clerk of the Senate Docu- 

 ment Room, under the general direction of the Joint 

 Committee on Printing. It consisted, not in the re- 

 printing of these reports, but merely their reassembling 

 and binding up according to the committees respon- 

 sible for them. The result was a collection of 515 

 volumes, some including several parts, the volume for 

 each committee being separately indexed. This com- 

 pilation, known as McKee's Compilation of Reports, 

 was intended for the use of the several standing com- 

 mittees of the two Houses and is not available outside 

 of Washington.* For the period covering the first 13 

 Congi-esses recourse can be had to American State 

 Papers. 



In one respect this system of reports would seem to 

 be open to criticism. In some cases, the reports repro- 

 duce the bills to which they relate and indicate the 

 specific changes recommended to be made in them. 

 This, however, is by no means the invariable rule. 

 This failure to reproduce the bill, either as introduced 

 and referred to the committee, or as recommended by 

 the committee for favorable action, may not be a seri- 

 ous disadvantage to the Members of Congress who are 

 supplied with copies of all bills introduced and as 

 reported with amendments by the committees. It does, 

 however, constitute a serious handicap to the outside 

 student wlio is placed under the necessity of securing 

 a copy of the bill, something he cannot always do if 



" A complete set of this compilatlOD Is not to be found even in 

 Washington. 



lie is making Ids study some time after the event. It 

 would seem to be a reasonable requirement of the rules 

 (hat all reports should set forth in full the bills re- 

 ported upon with changes recommended by the com- 

 mittee indicated. 



A further requirement that at least merits consider- 

 ation is that, when public hearings have been held, the 

 I)rinted rejjort of such hearings be attached to the com- 

 mittee report as an appendix. Were these two require- 

 ments met, the Member of Congress and the student 

 would have in cme volume, the bill as introduced, the 

 hearings upon such bill, the bill as amended by the 

 committee and the committee report in which the 

 action recommended is supported or opposed. As it 

 is, this information must be sought in a number of 

 separate documents which cannot always be easily 

 assembled. 



In the State legislatures, no such well developed sys- 

 tem of printed committee reports obtains. The re- 

 quirement that reports be in writing, in cases, either 

 does not exist, or is not rigidly adhered to. AVhen 

 written, they too often are of a more or less perfunc- 

 tory character. Few, if any. State legislatures make 

 provision for a separate series of committee reports. 

 A general practice is for the committee reports to be 

 set forth in full in the journal. It would appear that 

 loom exists for the material improvement of the whole 

 system of committee reports of the State legislatures. 



Record of Debates 



For a record of proceedings on the floor of the two 

 Houses of Congress, and especially the debates on pro- 

 posed action, there is available the four series: 



Annuh of Conyress, 17S9-1824. 

 Reyistcr of Debates, 1S24-1S37. 

 Congressional Globe, 1833-1873. 

 Conyressional Record, 1873 to date. 



For the period covered by the first of these series 

 these is no contemporary record of debates. Subse 

 quently the firm of Gales & Seaton compiled a record 

 of Congressional action during these years which was 

 published in 42 volumes. Congress subsidizing the work 

 by providing for the purchase of 2,000 sets. Those 

 Annals of Congress, as they were entitled, do not con- 

 tain a full report of proceedings but only abstracts of 

 the more important debates prepared by the compilers 

 from contemporaneous sources. 



Beginning with 182-4, the firm of Gales & Seaton 

 undertook the contemporaneous reporting of Congres- 

 sional proceedings under the title of Register of De- 

 hates, which was continued until 1837. This series is 

 not a complete report of proceedings : Debates are not 

 in all cases reported verbatim; and no part of the 



