You can search Congress.gov in many different ways. This overview describes the wide variety of places to begin your search. Consult Coverage Dates for Congress.gov Collections for the specific update schedules and start date for each collection.
From the homepage search bar you can select: Current Congress (includes all collections), All Congresses (includes all collections), Legislation, Committee Materials (includes committee reports, committee meetings and committee publications), Congressional Record, Members or Nominations. Use the collection menu to the left of the search box to change from the default Current Congress.
Why choose the search bar?
To quickly execute a simple search that can be edited with filters and refined by additional keywords using Search Within.
To quickly search across all collections for all available years.
A space between words in your search query is treated as an AND operator. See Search Operators for more information on using connectors in your query.
Query Builder
What can you search?
From the Query Builder you can search any combination of collections.
Why choose Query Builder?
To build precise, complex searches, row-by-row.
Use the plus (+) and minus (-) controls to add or remove rows. Combine rows with Boolean AND, OR or AND NOT. Nest searches using inner plus (+) and minus (-) controls.
More fields are available than on the search forms.
Calendar picker makes date searching easy.
Selection lists facilitate adding Legislative Actions, committees, etc. to your search query.
Caveats
Don’t use Search Operators. Use the provided lists (in the 3rd box on each row) to select operators: is, is near, contains, does not contain.
Command Line
What can you search?
From the Command Line box you can search any combination of collections.
Why choose Command Line?
To build precise, complex searches using fields. Combine search fields using Boolean AND, OR, or AND NOT.
Search the legislation collection dating from 1973 (93rd Congress) and the historical legislation collection dating from 1799 (6th Congress) to 1873 (42nd Congress) and from 1951 (82nd Congress) to 1972 (92nd Congress) from the Legislation Search Form.
Why choose the Legislation search form?
Limit search to titles and/or summaries and/or actions or search full text
The sponsors/cosponsors, committees, legislative actions search lists are unavailable on the search form for any Congress prior to the 93rd.
Legislation Advanced Search
What can you search?
From the Legislation Advanced form you can search the legislation collection, including records for every bill and resolution introduced in the U.S. Congress since 1973 (93rd Congress). You can also search historical legislation from 1799 (6th Congress) to 1873 (42nd Congress) and from 1951 (82nd Congress) to 1972 (92nd Congress).
Why choose Legislation Advanced?
The guided form supports precise, complex searches.
Use “EDIT THIS SEARCH” to easily make adjustments to your selections within the form.
Shortened URLs for search result pages are available.
Caveats
The subjects, action/status, sponsors/cosponsors, and committees sections of the form are unavailable on the search form for any Congress prior to the 93rd.
To exclusively search bill and law text language in different versions.
To search for language exclusively within specific bill text versions.
To construct complex keyword searches with multiple search terms, nesting, proximity/distance operators, and wildcards. You can read more about search operators for use specifically on the Legislation Text form at Search Tools.
Why choose to use the Congressional Record search form?
The guided form facilitates search using these criteria: Congress; Date of Issue; Section of the Congressional Record, and Member Remarks.
Caveats
Member Remarks and searchable headings are not available prior to 1995 (104th Congress). The Member Remarks selection list and the checkbox by “Headings” are unavailable on the search form if a Congress prior to the 104th is selected from the Congress selection list.
Congressional Record – Find by Date
What can you search?
From the Find an issue of the Record feature, click on the small calendar icon to see dates for which daily issues of the Record are available. Use calendar toggles to select the day, month, and year.
Why choose the Find an issue of the Record search form?
To retrieve a single issue of the Congressional Record by date.
Congressional Record – Find by Page Number
What can you search?
From the Find by Page Number feature, use the value lists to select the year (volume) and type the page number into the search box.
Why choose the Find by Page Number search form?
To retrieve a specific Congressional Record article by page number.
Nominations Search
What can you search?
Search the nominations collection dating from 1987 (100th Congress) and the historical nominations collection dating from 1981 (97th Congress) to 1986 (99th Congress) from the nominations form.
Why choose to use the Nominations search form?
The guided form facilitates search using these criteria: search only in Actions; Congress; Nomination Type; Presidential Nomination (PN) Number; Name; Positions; Organizations; Committee; State or Territory; any single item from the Nominations Actions picklist; or Date of Action.
Caveats
When using the Words & Phrases box, and you want to see the status of nominations in your search, do not try to combine the Words & Phrases search box with any of the options on the Nomination Actions drop-down menu. Instead, run your Words & Phrases search first, and then use the “Status of Nomination” filter on the results page to narrow down your results to nominations with a specific status.
Why choose to use the Executive Communications search form?
The guided form facilitates search using these criteria: House Document Number; Congress; Record and Communication types; Submitting Entity; limit to Federal Rulemaking items; Communication Numbers; Legal Authority; Committee; States and Territories; Congressional Record Date.
