POL 240
Public Law

Professor Bengtson
Spring 2008

Finding Laws

There are several sources for finding legislation on the Internet. Where you look depends on what level of law you are looking for: Federal, State or Local. keep in mind public laws are a matter of public record; governmental bodies are required to make this information publicly available. Most of them do so via the Internet, but not all.

Federal Laws:

The first place to look for federal legislation is Thomas , the Library of Congress government information portal.

The link will take you to the search box for the current Congressional session, if you want older legislation, click on Search Multiple, Previous Congresses .

This is also the best way to ensure that you are getting bills that have actually become laws. You should also click the button "Enrolled Bills Sent to the President"--this will ensure that you aren't looking at a bill that is still in committee or which has only been passed by one body.

State Laws:

Finding State Laws is a little trickier. A good place to start is the state government website.

Illinois.gov is Illinois'; if you are looking at a different state try Googling the state name plus the word "government".

Once you are there, try looking for links that say Legislature , Bills and Resolutions, etc. As with the Federal, however, you want to make sure you are looking at passed/enrolled legislation. Going with previous years is a better bet.

The Illinois General Assembly website is a good place to start as well (keep in mind different states call their legislative bodies different names).

Try looking at the Previous General Assemblies page; you can search here once you have selected a year.

Local Laws/Municipality Laws

Finding these can be even trickier than the state ones. Some city websites are not organized with ease of access to this information in mind.

Chicago's is a good example--the links to city legislation are on the Archived Guides To Legislation page, which is hard to find.

You want to be looking for links to a City Clerk's Office, Municipal Code, link, etc. You will have to hunt around a little.

Alternately, you can use Findlaw 's State Resources page to find the text of municipal codes (I have linked to Illinois', but you can find other states' there as well) . Almost every municipality in Illinois is listed there, with links to online sources for the Municipal Codes.

Writing and Citing Information

• Citing Electronic Resources
• College Writing and Citing: Styles by Discipline: Political Science
• ONLINE! Citation Styles
• Citing Sources from the Duke University Libraries