Honors American Government & Politics: Landmark Legislation Research Paper: Your Act of Legislation

From the Library of Congress: Citations for and Popular Names of Statutes

To cite your act of legislation in NoodleTools, follow these two steps:

• Choose where you found it: Database, Website, or Print Book.

• Select what it is: U.S. Statute 

  • Session Law : The U.S. Statutes at Large is a chronological arrangement of all public laws enacted by Congress.

  • Codified : The U.S. Code is an updated, subject arrangement of all general and permanent U.S. law so enacted.

  • NOTE: Public laws are first published separately as “slip laws”, are later bound together in the U.S. Statutes at Large, and are later codified in the United States Code. 
• Use the Popular Name Tool on the U.S. Code website to find the statute and code information for your act.
  • NOTE: Congress did not officially assign public law numbers to all statutes until 1957. Occasionally you will find one starting in 1908.
• An example in NoodleTools: Organic Act of 1916 (39 Stat. 535)