March 23, 2016

House Publishes Its Rules, Jefferson’s Manual, & More Online as Structured Data

Today the Government Publishing Office published the House Manual — which contains Rules of the House of Representatives, Jefferson’s Manual, and other important legislative documents — online in a structured data format on GitHub. GPO did so pursuant to direction from the House Rules Committee, which was acting in accordance with the rules package passed at the beginning of the 114th Congress, which declares:

The House shall continue efforts to broaden the availability of legislative documents in machine readable formats in the One Hundred Fourteenth Congress in furtherance of the institutional priority of improving public availability and use of legislative information produced by the House and its committees.

The online publication of key legislative documents as structured data is a welcome development. The Congressional Data Coalition has for a long time requested the enhancement, which empowers further analysis and reuse of the information in many different context. I, for one, will be glad to be able to automatically track revisions in the House Rules from Congress to Congress. I know others will find much more insightful uses.

All the offices and agencies involved with the project deserve congratulations, including: the House Rules Committee, the House Parliamentarian, the Clerk of the House, and the U.S. Government Publishing Office. (I’m sure there are more.)

The House Manual, as helpfully explained in the user guide to using the electronic version of the manual, includes:

  • the U.S. Constitution
  • Jefferson’s Manual
  • the Rules of the House of Representatives
  • Provisions of the Legislative Reorganization Acts
  • Congressional Budget Act laws
  • Legislative Procedures

All of the files can be found here. I have not had an opportunity to fully review what’s online — for example, I’m trying to find an unannotated version of the House Rules— but GPO has helpfully requested feedback on the GitHub page.

House Rules Committee Chairman Pete Sessions hailed the move in a statement:

Technology plays an important role in our daily lives, and it is necessary that the House keep up with the most efficient and effective ways to provide information about Congressional activities. As Chairman of the House Rules Committee, I am committed to the advancement of sharing legislative data online and am confident that our efforts will result in a better informed public.

GPO explained, in a press release, the value of publishing the documents in a more flexible format:

Making Government information available in XML permits data to be reused and repurposed not only for print output but for conversion into ebooks, mobile web applications, and other forms of content delivery, including data mashups and other analytical tools by third party providers, which contributes to openness and transparency in Government.

Good job. And thank you.

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March 23, 2016

2016 Legislative Data & Transparency Conference Set for June 21

The Committee on House Administration will host its fifth annual Legislative Data and Transparency Conference on June 21, from 9-4 in the U.S. Capitol.

Free registration is now open. Continue Reading

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March 22, 2016

A Guide for Appropriators on Opening Up Congressional Information and Making Congress Work Better

For the fifth year in a row, today members of the Congressional Data Coalition submitted testimony to House Appropriators on ways to open up legislative information. The bipartisan coalition focused on tweaking congressional procedures and releasing datasets that, in the hands of third parties, will strengthen Congress’ capacity to govern.Continue Reading

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February 24, 2016

Congress open up the tap for Legislative Data!

Today the Government Publishing Office and Library of Congress completed a full revolution in public access to legislative information. Information about legislative actions in congress–the bills, summaries of the bills, and their status–is now available online, in bulk, in a structured data format. As I wrote in December, this has great significance:

  • It marks the publication of essential legislative information in a format that supports unlimited public reuse, analysis, and republication. It is now possible to see much of a bill’s life cycle.
  • It illustrates the positive relationship that has grown between Congress and the public on access to legislative information, where there is growing open dialog and conversation about how to best meet our collective needs.
  • It is an example of how different components within the legislative branch are engaging with one another on a range of data-related issues, sometimes for the first time ever, under the aegis of the Bulk Data Task Force.
  • It means the Library of Congress and GPO will no longer be tied to the antiquated THOMAS website and can focus on more rapid technological advancement. (At least for data from the 113th and 114th Congresses).
  • It shows how a diverse community of outside organizations and interests came together and built a community to work with Congress for the common good.

Many more good things are on the horizon, and we have hopes for many more from Congress and civic coders, but for now, congratulations to our tireless friends in Congress and the legislative support offices and agencies that have labored to make this happen. Read their announcement here.

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December 8, 2015

Congress Poised for Leap to Open Up Legislative Data

Following bills in Congress requires three major pieces of information: the text of the bill, a summary of what the bill is about, and the status information associated with the bill. For the last few years, Congress has been publishing the text and summaries for all legislation moving in Congress, but has not published bill status information. This key information is necessary to identify the bill author, where the bill is in the legislative process, who introduced the legislation, and so on.

While it has been in the works for a while, this week Congress confirmed it will make “Bill Statuses in XML format available through the GPO’s Federal Digital System (FDsys) Bulk Data repository starting with the 113th Congress,” (i.e. January 2013).  In “early 2016,” bill status information will be published online in bulk– here. This should mean that people who wish to use the legislative information published on Congress.gov and THOMAS will no longer need to scrape those websites for current legislative information, but instead should be able to access it automatically.Continue Reading

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October 27, 2015

Second Congressional Hackathon a Great Success

On Friday, the House of Representatives held its second Congressional Hackathon, co-hosted by Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer.InHackWeTrust flag

The major, unstated purpose of the hackathon was to bring people together to sustain the effort to modernize technology in congress. The hackathon did exactly that, gathering congressional staff, legislative support staff, and members of the public to build those relationships in a constructive atmosphere. It was an incredible success.Continue Reading

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October 17, 2015

More info on Congressional Hackathon

Today Reps. Hoyer and McCarthy released more information on the upcoming Congressional Hackathon. Here is the press release. The Congressional Data Coalition will be hosting a happy hour afterward.

 

WASHINGTON, D.C. – House Democratic Whip Steny H. Hoyer (MD-5) and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (CA-23) today announced details of the upcoming Second Congressional Hackathon that will take place next week on Friday, October 23, 2015 from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm in the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.Continue Reading

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October 5, 2015

Library of Congress, GPO Should Publish the Digitized Congressional Record

At a meeting in April, the Government Publishing Office announced its collaboration with the Library of Congress to digitize all bound volumes of the Congressional Record from 1873-1998. The Congressional Record is the official record of the proceedings and debates of the United States Congress.

The digitization project is pursuant to a 2010 Joint Committee on Printing letter. GPO explained at the April meeting that it had digitized all of the volumes and the “[Library Services and Content Management business unit] was in the acquisitions process for the next step of reviewing the digital content and creating descriptive metadata.”

GPO and the Library should release the digitized volumes now. Even without metadata, the Congressional Record could be searched and put to other uses. Other digitization projects concerning documents held by the Library have taken years while descriptive metadata was created. By contrast, a volunteer-led effort to create descriptive metadata for the Statutes of Large took a matter of months and cost the government nothing. Continue Reading

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October 3, 2015

Congressional Technology Fellowship Program Launches

Travis Moore and New America’s Open Technology Institute announced the creation of TechCongress, a new fellowship program that places technologists in congressional offices. It will launch in 2016, and they are actively seeking applicants.

This is a great initiative with tremendous promise.

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September 18, 2015

Save the Date: Second Congressional Hackathon Oct. 23

The Second Congressional Hackathon will take place at the U.S. Capitol on October 23 from 10-5. Hosted by Majority Leader McCarthy and Democratic Whip Hoyer, the hackathon is intended to explore how we can modernize Congress–from open data to updating constituent engagement.

To RSVP, go here.

The First Congressional Hackathon–#InHackWeTrust–was a great event, with tons of information about the ongoing work of the House and, equally as important, it presented a fantastic opportunity for real conversations between staff, technologists, and advocates. I wrote about it here.

With the same offices behind this hackathon, we have high hopes. Since the first congressional hackathon, there has been a series of public meetings and conferences hosted by the Clerk of the House, the launch of new pro-transparency congressional policies and tools, the creation of the open source caucus, and a civil society-organized congressional hackathon entitled #Hack4Congress. With so many new resources available (and more coming soon), and a spirit of cooperation between congressional staff and the public, I cannot wait to see what can be accomplished.

We will post more information as it becomes available.

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