About Hearings & Testimonies
A committee holds hearings to determine facts, to sample opinion, and to carry out its oversight functions. A hearing on a bill will usually reprint the bill. Hearings are not held for all legislation; not all hearings are published. The published hearing includes the testimony of witnesses, transcripts of question and answer sessions, and copies of any exhibits and materials introduced.
Hearings are not always about a bill. They may be exploratory or investigative.
The testimony of the hearing (available through ProQuest Congressional 1988 -) is the transcript or prepared text of the witnesses and the transcript of the question and answer session. Note: testimonies are available much more quickly than the published hearing.
Identifying & Locating Hearings
If you have a title, be sure to search DELCAT. If you wish to search by keywords, your searching may be easier in some of the full text databases, such as ProQuest Congressional Publications.
- govinfo (Government Publishing Office)A service that provides free public access to the full text of official publications from all three branches of the Federal Government. Includes: the Budget, Economic Report of the President, selected Committee hearings 1997 (105th Cong)-, Public and Private Laws, Senate and House journals, Congressional Record (1994-), Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, Congressional bills (1995, 104th Congress -), Presidential papers, and many more.
Produced by GPO, the Government Publishing Office. The service was formerly called FDsys.
- ProQuest Congressional This link opens in a new windowIdentifies congressional publications from 1789 to present. Full text varies by type of publication.
Full text is available for recent publications, including Senate and House Reports and Documents (Serial Set), laws, testimony given in Congressional hearings 1988 (100th Cong)-, the Congressional Record 1985 (99th Cong)-, House and Senate Documents 1995 (104th Cong)- and Reports 1990 (101st Cong)-, Committee Prints 1993 (103rd Cong)-. Legislative Histories are available for 1996 (106th Cong) -.
The Library has many of the full text microfiche sets indexed in ProQuest Congressional, including House and Senate Unpublished Hearings and Historical hearings set (Microfiche-Group number).
News: searchable database of articles from the Washington Post, Roll Call newspapers, and CQ Political Transcripts.
Note: for Serial Set publications prior to 1995, see a different database. Search for "serial set" on the library databases list. - HeinOnline Academic This link opens in a new windowComprehensive coverage of U.S. statutory materials, U.S. Congressional Documents (Congressional Record and Hearings early 1900s-present), all U.S. treaties, collections of classic treatises, and presidential documents.
Locating Hearings in the UD Library (print and microfiche)
This table will be useful when locating hearings which have been identified in the ProQuest Congressional database (Library Databases). First check DELCAT Discovery then use this table.
| Date | Congress | Microforms Collection | U.S. Documents Microfiche | Annex U.S. Documents |
| Prior to 1975 | Prior to 94th Cong | Arranged by Y 4 SuDoc call numbers | ||
| 1975-1981 | 95th Cong to 97th Cong, 1st sess | Microfiche no. 2100 (arranged by ProQuest/ CIS accession numbers) | Arranged by Y 4 SuDoc call numbers | |
| 1982- | 97th Cong, 2nd sess- | Arranged by Y 4 SuDoc call numbers | ||
|
1833 to 1952 Historical set- identified as Microfiche Group (number) |
23rd to 82nd Cong | Microfiche no. 2075 (arranged by Group numbers and ProQuest/ CIS accession numbers) | ||
|
Unpublished House Hearings Unpublished Senate Hearings |
Microfiche various call numbers (arranged by ProQuest/ CIS accession numbers). |
Unpublished Committee Hearings
Many hearings which were not published at the time they were held may became available for publication years later. These are indexed in the ProQuest Congressional Publications database. The Library has these sets of hearings in microfiche format:
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House Unpublished Hearings
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Senate Unpublished Hearings
Unpublished U.S. House of Representatives Committee Hearings.
Location: Morris Library - Microforms (Microfiche no. 1961; 2025; 2027; 2037; 2076; 2081)
| 1833-1936 | Microfiche no. 1961 | 1954-1958 | Microfiche no. 2037 | |
| 1937-1946 | Microfiche no. 2025 | 1959-1964 | Microfiche no. 2076 | |
| 1947-1954 | Microfiche no. 2027 | 1965-1968 | Microfiche no. 2081 |
Unpublished U.S. Senate Committee Hearings.
Location: Morris Library - Microforms (Microfiche no. 2026, 2029, 2074, 2077, 2093)
| 1823-1964 | Microfiche no. 2029 | 1973-1976 | Microfiche no. 2077 | |
| 1965-1968 | Microfiche no. 2026 | 1977-1980 | Microfiche no. 2093 | |
| 1969-1972 | Microfiche no. 2074 |