Thanks for the information about LC's digitized collection Rick! I
didn't know about it. I chime in to mention the difference between the
CIS set and the GPO set. We have both and this request provided a good
opportunity for me to compare the two, since some bills were from 95
and some were from 96 -- thus straddling the break between our two
sets.
The CIS set is marked in the fiche header (the bit that you can read
while they're in the drawer) with bill (or resolution) numbers. It
includes the familiar CIS tabbed dividers with bill numbers on them. I
was able to pull the three bills from the 95th congress in about a
minute.
The GPO fiche has no similar guide numbers, so it took about 10 minutes
to figure out which card had the bill I needed on it. Referring to
Thomas to find the date the bill was introduced was very helpful since
the GPO set appears to be strictly chronological, including versions of
bills reported out and amended. Because of this arrangement it's not
always easy to tell where you are in the bill sequence (as introduced).
(e.g. you can scan the fiche for the big bill numbers on the title
pages, but they are not chronological -- one card may have H.R. 100 as
introduced, then H.R. 56 as amended, the H.R. 101 as introduced, then
H.R. 23 as reported out...)
I sum, because of the visible indexing on the cards, the CIS version is
easier to use, at least for finding bills as introduced. As a
colleague noted, "No one does fiche like CIS."
Scott
__________
Scott Matheson, Reference and Government Documents Librarian
Lillian Goldman Law Library, Yale Law School
P O Box 208215, New Haven, CT 06520-8215 - (203) 432-6759
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