Congressional Documents: Comm. Hearings

Hearings can be excellent sources of policy information, the perspectives of witnesses and committee members, and data.

Hearings are held by congressional committees to gather information on proposed legislation or to conduct oversight, including "the review, monitoring, and supervision of the implementation of public policy".* Hearings are also held to investigate issues of national importance, such as the Pearl Harbor attack or the Watergate break-in. Senate committees hold confirmation hearings for presidential nominees. (More on types of hearings) Expert witnesses or people who will be affected by the proposed legislation may be called to testify. They may bring along exhibits which may provide information hard to find anywhere else.

While most hearings are published, committees are not required to publish transcripts of hearings. The Committee Chair makes the decision to do so, and decides whether the hearing will be published in paper or digitally or both. Publication can happen quickly, be delayed for months, or never occur. Bowdoin has most published hearings in paper from 2003 to 2010 and scattered hearings from other time periods. Otherwise, Bowdoin Library provides access to hearings in digital format.

Some committees, especially in the House, issue a Hearing Memorandum, which often contain a statement of the purpose of the hearing, witnesses, background information, and a short bibliography. Look for these from 2004-2011 in ProQuest Congressional in the Committee Prints & Misc. Publications database.

Google Books has digitized many hearings from the twentieth century. If you know the title of the hearing, search Google Books with keywords in that title. Or try the phrase "hearing before the committee" with a subject word and limit to "full view only." HathiTrust and the Internet Archive are other sources for historical hearings.

* Congressional Research Service, Types of Committee Hearings, 2015.