Miscellaneous Internet Resources Related to the Federal Government

This page lists lots of Internet-based resources for getting information on Congress and the rest of the Federal Government. This is just a quick summary of those resources. The Federal Government maintains a site called FirstGov which is supposed to help citizens navigate the huge number of government web sites. I highly suggest you start your search there if this page doesn't contain what you are looking for.

This page is divided into the following sections:

The United States Senate

The United States Senate has members which are elected to six year terms by voters from the entire state. There are two Senators per state. In any given election year, roughly one third of Senators are up for re-election. The following services on the Internet are related to the Senate:

• The Senate WWW Homepage
• Senate Calendar of Business: Today's Floor Schedule for the Senate.
• The U.S. Senate Historical Office can provide a lot of information on the history of the Senate and biographies of all current and former senators. For more historical information, you can email the Office of the Senate Historian at historian@sec.senate.gov.

Committees of the Senate:
The Senate committee structure includes Standing Committees (which generally have legislative jurisdiction) and Select, Special, Other, and Joint Committees (which are chiefly for oversight or housekeeping tasks). Full Senate Committee and Subcommittee information is available on the Committees and Subcommittees page.

• Not exactly partisan, but the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) Foundation also has a WWW homepage which maintains a Member Directory of the CBC.

Senate Leadership
A quick look at the Senate Leadership will reveal that the leadership is divided by political party. This is also evident in the existence of the following committees and conferences WWW homepages:

• The Democratic Policy Committee has two email addresses.
  • An automated information server is available at info@dpc.senate.gov [make sure to use "Help" as your subject].
  • General Comments and Questions should be sent to postmaster@dpc.senate.gov
• The Republican Policy Committee has an email address webmaster@rpc.senate.gov

Senate Schedule and Activities
Keeping track of what is going on in the Senate is important if you are planning when you need to contact your Senators. Here are some sites that can help you track down which committees are discussing what matters...

• Senate Legislative Activities: This page lists schedules for Committee Meetings and Hearings and outlines lots of the upcoming matters to be discussed.
• Senate Calendar of Business: A searchable daily calendar of Senate business provided by the US Government Printing Office
• Senate Roll Call Votes: This is where you can look up the voting records on floor votes for every member of the Senate.

The United States House of Representatives

The United States House of Representatives has members which are elected to two year terms by voters of "district" within a state. The number of districts a state has (and thus the number of Representatives in the House) is determined by it's population, with an absolute minimum of one Representative per state. All members of the House of Representative are up for election every election year. The House also has non-voting "delegates" from territories of the United States (Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa, and the U.S. Virgin Islands). The following services on the Internet are related to the House of Representatives:

• The U.S. House of Representatives WWW Homepage
• For the most recent list of House members and committees using email, send an email to congress@mail.house.gov
• For more information on what is available electronically from the House of Representatives, send email to househlp@mail.house.gov
• House Calendar of Business: Today's Floor Schedule for the House of Representatives.

Committees of the House of Representatives:
Like the Senate, the House's lawmaking efforts are very complex, so the work gets broken up into committees and subcommittees. Complete contact information for all House Committees and Subcommittees is available on the Committees and Subcommittees page.

• National Commission on Restructuring the Internal Revenue Service
• Not exactly partisan, but the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) Foundation also has a WWW homepage which maintains a Member Directory of the CBC.

House of Representatives Leadership
Again, like the Senate, the House Leadership from the two major parties have set up some partisan committees. They offer the following partisan pages on there computers:

• The Office of the Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, has a special homepage for news related to the office. Representative Hastert has a separate homepage for district issues.
• The Office of the House Majority Leader, Tom DeLay, has a homepage.
• The Office of the House Minority Leader, nancy Pelosi, has a homepage.

House Schedule and Activities
Keeping track of what is going on in the House is important if you are planning when you need to contact your Representative. Here are some sites that can help you track down which committees are discussing what matters...

• Today in Committee: Daily schedules of House committees are posted on this page.
• House Committee Hearing Schedules and Oversight Plans: Links to schedules for every committee in the House.
• House Program for the Week: To quote the House homepage, this page provides "The schedule of bills, resolutions, and other legislative issues the House intends to consider this week. Updated each business day when the House is in session."
• Current House Floor Proceedings: This page lists activities that have occurred thus far today, helps you keep track of which committees have finished business for the day.
• House of Representatives Calendar of Business: A searchable daily calendar of House business provided by the US Government Printing Office
• U.S. House of Representatives Roll Call Votes: The place to look up the floor votes for any member of the House.

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Other Governmental Sites on the Internet

Along with services directly related to the U.S. Senate or House of Representatives, there are other online services offered by the United States Government or related to it that can be helpful in allowing your to be an informed constituent and voter.

Legislative Branch:

• The Library of Congress maintains several online services:
  • The Library of Congress WWW Homepage
  • The Library of Congress Information System Telnet Access
  • THOMAS: Legislative Information on the Internet provides up-to-date information on Legislative activity.
  • The United States Copyright Office is part of the Library of Congress.
• Congressional Budget Office: The government agency designed to "provide the Congress with objective, timely, nonpartisan analyses needed for economic and budget decisions."
• Government Printing Office is where you can search the full text of many government documents, including:
  • Congressional Information: links to the congressional information offered by the GPO.
  • The Congressional Record: The official record of the proceedings and debates of the United States Congress, published daily when Congress is in session.
  • GPO Access: Search a variety of Government databases, including proposed bills in Congress, the Congressional Directory, and the U.S. Code (to name just a few).
• Guide to Frequently Mispronounced Congressional Names: Want to know how to pronounce your member of Congress' name before you talk to their office? This page will help.

Judicial Branch:

• Decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court are available online, thanks to Cornell's Law School.
• FindLaw: Supreme Court Opinions is a searchable database of all Supreme Court decisions since 1906.
• The Federal Courts' Home Page is "a clearinghouse of information from and about the Judicial Branch of the U.S. Government."
• Internet Legal Research Compass (a service of the Villanova Center for Information Law and Policy) provides lots of information on Federal Judiciary.
• U.S. Supreme Court Multimedia Records: The Supreme Court has been recording its public sessions since October of 1957 and now some of those recordings are being made available online (requires free RealAudio software).

Executive Branch:

• The White House has a very strong presence on the Internet with continuously updated WWW Homepage with lots of information about the Executive Branch. If you are young, you may be interested in the White House for Kids web site. You also have the ability to directly e-mail various people in the White House including (NOTE: The White House has a policy of not replying via email, so don't expect anything other than a ground mail reply):
  • President George W. Bush at comments@whitehouse.gov
    (This actually appears to be a general White House mailbox, but the old email address for the President [President@whitehouse.gov] has been disabled.)
  • Vice-President Richard Cheney at vice_president@whitehouse.gov
  • First Lady Laura Bush at First_Lady@whitehouse.gov
  • The Wife of the Vice-President, Mrs. Lynne Cheney at mrs.cheney@whitehouse.gov
• Also, you can track down almost everything in the Executive Branch of Government using the links to the President's Cabinet. The Cabinet includes:

  The Department of Agriculture The Department of Commerce The U.S. Census Bureau offers official Social, Demographic, and Economic Information about the United States. The United States Patent and Trademark Office has been protecting inventors since 1790. The National Weather Service provides weather forecasts for locations across the U.S. The Department of Defense The U.S. Air Force The U.S. Army The U.S. Coast Guard The U.S. Marine Corp The U.S. National Guard The U.S. Navy The Department of Education The Department of Energy The Department of Health and Human Services The Federal Food and Drug Adminstration is in charge of making sure what humans in the U.S. consume is reasonably safe. The National Institutes of Health is the Federal focal point for biomedical research in the U.S The Department of Homeland Security The Department of Housing and Urban Development

  The Department of the Interior The Bureau of Indian Affairs is in charge of management of the U.S. "Indian" Reservations. The National Park Service keeps some parts of our country just a little wilder. The Department of Justice The Office of the U.S. Attorney General The Federal Bureau of Investigation The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) The Immigration and Naturalization Service The Department of Labor The Department of State The Department of Transportation The Department of the Treasury The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms has been in the news the last few years. The U.S. Customs is in charge of monitoring what is brought into the US The Internal Revenue Service tries to make sure we all pay our federal taxes properly. The U.S. Secret Service protects the president and the nations' currency. The Small Business Administration is in charge of encouraging small businesses in the U.S. The Department of Veterans Affairs

Other Government Agencies

• The Central Intelligence Agency doesn't just spy on people, they also offer the various publications, including the World Factbook.
• The Directorate of Time at the U.S. Naval Observatory is the official source of time in the U.S.
• The Environmental Protection Agency is the government agency in charge of protecting the U.S. from it's polluters.
• The Federal Communications Commission is the government agency in charge of communications, including the Internet (within the U.S.).
• The Federal Election Commission has a WWW site with information on the legalities of running for federal office.
• The Federal Emergency Management Agency is the agency in charge of helping people after disaster strikes.
• The Federal Trade Commission enforces a variety of federal antitrust and consumer protection laws.
• Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe can be reached via email at csce@mail.house.gov
• The National Archives and Records Administration is "the government agency responsible for overseeing the management of the records of the federal government."
• The Social Security Administration manages the largest entitlement program in the U.S.
• The United States Information Agency provides a lot of information about the U.S. Government, including digital versions of the Constitution and an Outline of American History.
• The United States Postal Service tries to get the mail there quickly. They do offer an excellent ZIP code lookup service and an online version of their Moving Tips.

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"Non-Partisan" Sites with Congressional Information

There are also several other online services designed to help you be a more informed constituent and voter. I have assembled a list of some of those services here, making an effort to use only non-partisan services.

Voting Histories/Recent Activities of Congressmembers:

• THOMAS: Legislative Information on the Internet The official source of information from the U.S. Congress.
• Senate Roll Call Votes: This is where you can look up the voting records on floor votes for every member of the Senate.
• U.S. House of Representatives Roll Call Votes: The place to look up the floor votes in the House.
• Project Vote Smart WWW Homepage lists full voting records and ratings by political groups (on both the left and right of the political spectrum) of members of Congress.
• Voter Information Services (VIS) provides ratings on Congressmembers based on their voting records compared to the beliefs of certain groups. VIS itself claims to be non-partisan.
• Political Moneyline: Since money can influence politicians in very shady ways, I have included for your purusal this link to a non-partisan page listing lots on information about Federal candidates and their contributors.

Other Sites With Contact Information for Congressmembers:

• FirstGov: The Federal Government attempt to keep track of its own websites.
• Government Resources on the Web: Put together by Grace York at the U Michigan Documents Center, this site is a very, very complete listing of Government information available on the Net. Use it to find almost anything about anybody or any agency in the U.S. Government and some Foreign ones.

Sites specializing in Political News:

• Roll Call is "the newspaper of Capitol Hill since 1955." They offer news from the Hill everyday, usually in a long, more detailed format than available in your standard newspaper.
• The Hill: "The Capitol Newspaper" provides weekly in-depth stories on the activities of the denizens of Capitol Hill.
• C-SPAN WWW Homepage: The first major television network dedicated solely to covering Politics.

State-level Government Information:

• For a quick and easy list of State Governors' WWW sites and email addresses, check out UMich Documents Center Governor Email Addresses and WWW sites list, provided by Grace York.
• Project Vote Smart provides lots of State-level Government information (which I link to on the individual state pages on this site).

Miscellaneous but Interesting Sites Related To Federal Politics:

• U. S. Founding Documents: Contains copies of the Original U.S. Constitution and U.S. Declaration of Independence and other Founding documents for the United States in almost every format imaginable.