Topic: Federal Legislative History and Analysis — Hearings

House and Senate committees hearings are held to discuss proposed legislation, and often provide data and testimony of expert witnesses. Examples:

Climate change : status of the Kyoto Protocol after three years : joint hearing before the Committee on Foreign Relations and the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. United States Senate, One Hundred Sixth Congress, second session, September 28, 2000. SuDoc. number: Y 4.F 76/2:S.HRG.106-808

Most hearings begin with Y 4. in the SuDoc number, followed by an abbreviation for the committee (F for Foreign Relations); at the end of the SuDoc, hearings are numbered consecutively throughout a Congress for each committee.

Tips for locating references to Hearings:

• 'All Actions' display for legislation included in Congress.gov may indicate whether hearings took place on a particular bill, but may not provide a link to the text of the hearing
• Use FDsys to locate pdf of hearings held from 1985-present.
• Carefully study and committee prints or reports for mentions of relevant hearing dates, and search for the hearing in ProQuest Congressional below.
• The Monthly Catalog of United States Government Publications (Babbidge Federal Documents Reading Room - Level B:   J 83 .M 66) in the final edition for each year provides a cumulative list of all reports, prints, and hearings published by each House and Senate committee.
• WorldCat can also be used to locate committee reports, prints, and hearings.

Hearings from a select number of House and Senate committees are available in print on Level B in the Babbidge Library​ from the 1950s to early 2000s. From 1976-present, most are included in the library catalog. SuDoc numbers for hearings begin with Y 4.