Congressional Research Service

For the Wikipedia template used to credit content to CRS Reports, see Template:Congressional Research Service.

Congressional Research Service

Agency overview
Formed	July 16, 1914 (1914-07-16)
Headquarters	Washington, D.C., U.S.
Annual budget	$106.8 million (2012)
Agency executives	Mary B. Mazanec, Director T.J. Halstead, Deputy Director
Website	www.loc.gov/crsinfo/

The Congressional Research Service (CRS), known as Congress's think tank, is a public policy research arm of the United States Congress. As a legislative branch agency within the Library of Congress, CRS works primarily and directly for Members of Congress, their Committees and staff on a confidential, nonpartisan basis.

Its staff of approximately 600 employees includes lawyers, economists, reference librarians, and social, natural, and physical scientists. In fiscal year 2016, CRS was appropriated a budget of roughly $106.9 million by Congress.

CRS is joined by two major congressional support agencies. The Congressional Budget Office provides Congress with budget-related information, reports on fiscal, budgetary, and programmatic issues, and analyses of budget policy options, costs, and effects. The Government Accountability Office assists Congress in reviewing and monitoring the activities of government by conducting independent audits, investigations, and evaluations of federal programs. Collectively, the three agencies employ more than 4,000 people.

History

In 1914, Senator Robert La Follette Sr. and Representative John M. Nelson, both of Wisconsin, promoted the inclusion in the legislative, executive, and judicial appropriations act of a provision directing the establishment of a special reference unit within the Library of Congress. Building upon a concept developed by the New York State Library in 1890, and the Wisconsin Legislative Reference Library in 1901, they were motivated by Progressive era ideas about the importance of the acquisition of knowledge for an informed and independent legislature. The move also reflected the expanding role of the librarian and the professionalization of the profession. The new department was charged with responding to congressional requests for information. The legislation authorized the Librarian of Congress, Herbert Putnam, to “employ competent persons to prepare such indexes, digests, and compilations of laws as may be required for Congress and other official use...” (The intent behind the creation of the agency can be derived from U.S. Senate, Committee on the Library, Legislative Drafting Bureau and Reference Division, 62d Cong., 3d sess., 1913, S. Rept.1271.)

Renamed the Legislative Reference Service and given a permanent authorization with the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1946, it assisted Congress primarily by providing facts and publications and by transmitting research and analysis done largely by other government agencies, private organizations, and individual scholars.

The Library of Congress, the home of CRS, had experimented during the 1940s with unrestricted publication Public Affairs Bulletins, which were produced by staff of the Legislative Reference Service, and devoted to various public policy issues. They were promoted by Archibald MacLeish, the Librarian of Congress, and, among other topics, addressed timely policy issues, such as American national defense. About 100 Public Affairs Bulletins were generated before congressional appropriators ended their production in 1951.

The renaming under the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1970 reflected the service's changing mission: This legislation directed CRS to devote more of its efforts and increased resources to doing research and analysis that assists Congress in direct support of the legislative process.

When the Congressional Research Service Review was launched in 1980, it continued for a little more than a decade before congressional appropriators, once again, invoked fiscal closure. The Review, which was published ten times a year and available to the public by subscription, offered original analytical articles, summaries highlighting CRS research products, and other kinds of assistance to the congressional community.

As inquiries increased from 400,000 questions per year in 1980 to 598,000 in 2000, CRS sought to prepare itself for future challenges, initiating an organizational realignment in 1999. The realignment, which has required extensive relocation of staff and the design of more efficient workstations, was intended to promote improved communication within CRS and increase the service's ability to focus on legislative deliberations of Congress by applying its multidisciplinary expertise to public policy issues in user-friendly, accessible formats when Congress needs assistance.

Mission

CRS offers Congress research and analysis on all current and emerging issues of national policy. CRS offers timely and confidential assistance to all Members and committees that request it, limited only by CRS’s resources and the requirements for balance, nonpartisanship and accuracy.

CRS makes no legislative or other policy recommendations to Congress; its responsibility is to ensure that Members of the House and Senate have available the best possible information and analysis on which to base the policy decisions the American people have elected them to make. In all its work, CRS analysts are governed by requirements for confidentiality, timeliness, accuracy, objectivity, balance, and nonpartisanship.

CRS services are not limited to those that relate directly to enacting new laws. For example, CRS attempts to assess emerging issues and developing problems so that it will be prepared to assist the Congress if and when it becomes necessary. Although it rarely conducts field research, CRS assists committees in other aspects of their study and oversight responsibilities. In addition, it offers numerous courses, including legal research seminars and institutes on the legislative process, the budget processes, and the work of district and state staff. At the beginning of each Congress, CRS also provides an orientation seminar for new Members.

CRS does not conduct research on sitting Members or living former Members of Congress, unless granted specific permission by that Member or if that Member is nominated by the President for another office.

Organization

CRS is now divided into six interdisciplinary research divisions, each of which is further divided into subject specialist sections. The six divisions are: American Law; Domestic Social Policy; Foreign Affairs, Defense and Trade; Government and Finance; Knowledge Services; and Resources, Science and Industry.

The six research divisions are supported in their work by five “infrastructure” offices: Finance and Administration, Information Management and Technology, Counselor to the Director, Congressional Information and Publishing, and Workforce Management and Development.

Overview of services

Responses to Congressional requests take the form of reports, memoranda, customized briefings, seminars, videotaped presentations, information obtained from automated databases, and consultations in person and by telephone.

CRS "supports the Members, committees, and leaders of the House and Senate at all stages of the legislative process":

• Ideas for legislation. A 2008 CRS report details how the service can assist legislators in evaluating the need for legislation:

At the preliminary stage, members may ask CRS to provide background information and analysis on issues and events so they can better understand the existing situation and then assess whether there is a problem requiring a legislative remedy. This assistance may be a summary and explanation of the scientific evidence on a technically complex matter, for example, or it may be a collection of newspaper and journal articles discussing an issue from different perspectives, or a comparative analysis of several explanations that have been offered to account for a generally recognized problem. CRS also identifies national and international experts with whom Members and staff may consult about whatever issues concern them and sponsors programs at which Members meet with experts to discuss issues of broad interest to Congress.

• Analyzing a bill. The same 2008 report also clarifies the various ways in which the service further supports the work of legislators once a bill has been introduced:

If a Member decides to introduce a bill, CRS analysts can assist the legislator in clarifying the purposes of the bill, identifying issues it may address, defining alternative ways for dealing with them, evaluating the possible advantages and disadvantages of each alternative, developing information and arguments to support the bill, and anticipating possible criticisms of the bill and responses to them. Although CRS does not draft bills, resolutions, and amendments, its analysts may join staff consulting with the professional draftsman within each chamber’s Office of the Legislative Counsel as they translate the Member’s policy decisions into formal legislative language. Members and committees also can request CRS to help them assess and compare legislative proposals, including competing bills introduced by Members and proposals presented by executive branch officials, private citizens and organizations. CRS can assess the intent, scope, and limits, of the various proposals.

The report goes on:

During committee and floor consideration, CRS can assist Representatives and Senators in several different ways, in addition to providing background information to assist Members in understanding the issues a bill addresses. CRS attorneys can help clarify legal effects the bill may have. CRS policy analysts can work with Members in deciding whether to propose amendments and then in making certain that their amendments are designed and phrased to achieve the desired results. CRS also can help Members prepare for the debate by providing data and other information that they can use to support the positions they have decided to take.

• Hearings. When a subcommittee selects a bill (or several bills on the same subject) for serious attention, it usually begins by conducting public hearings on one or more days at which executive branch officials, other Members of Congress, representatives of private organizations, and even individual citizens present their views on the bill’s merits. CRS analysts can assist in this process by providing background information and reports, presenting a preliminary briefing to Members or staff, identifying potential witnesses, and suggesting questions that Members may consider asking the witnesses.
• Subcommittee or committee votes. After the hearings on a bill, the subcommittee or committee meets to debate and vote on amendments to it. If requested, CRS staff may attend these meetings to serve as a nonpartisan source of expert information available to all Members. If the subcommittee and then the full committee conclude that new legislation is needed, they report a bill to the House or Senate for all its Members to consider. The committee also submits a written report that explains the background for its decision, analyzes the purposes and effects of each major provision of the bill, and includes other information, such as predictions about the cost of implementing it, that help other Members decide whether they should support the bill. CRS specialists may assist the committee’s staff in preparing some sections of this report, although cost estimates are developed by the Congressional Budget Office.
• Parliamentary procedure. CRS staff can clarify the legislative procedures of the House and Senate, assisting Members and staff in understanding the effects of these procedures and how Members can use the procedures to promote their own legislative goals.
• Conference committees. CRS analysts can contribute to this last stage of the legislative process by helping identify the issues to be resolved, by clarifying and comparing the positions of the two houses on each issue, and by identifying different ways in which the legislative disagreements could be resolved.

CRS also performs several functions that support Congressional and public understanding of the legislative process and other issues.

• Bill Summaries. Since 1935 the Legislative Analysis and Information Section (formerly "Bill Digest") of CRS has had statutory responsibility for preparation of authoritative, objective, nonpartisan summaries of introduced public bills and resolutions and maintenance of historical legislative information. Detailed revised summaries are written to reflect changes made in the course of the legislative process. This CRS office also prepares titles, bill relationships, subject terms, and Congressional Record citations for debates, full texts of measures, and Member introductory remarks. The bill summaries are released to the public via THOMAS, the Library of Congress's online database.
• Constitution Annotated. The American Law Division of the Congressional Research Service prepares the Constitution of the United States of America—Analysis and Interpretation (popularly known as the Constitution Annotated), a continuously updated legal treatise that explains the U.S. Constitution as it has been interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Congressional Research Service reports

Reports by the Congressional Research Service, usually referred to as CRS Reports, are the encyclopedic research reports written to clearly define issues in a legislative context.

Over 700 new CRS reports are produced each year; 566 new products were prepared in Fiscal Year 2011. Nearly 7,800 were in existence as of the end of 2011.

The types of CRS reports include Issue Briefs (IB), Research Memos (RM), and Reports, which appear in both Short (RS) and Long (RL) formats.

How to access CRS Reports

As of September 18, 2018, most CRS reports are available to the public through the official US Congress website crsreports.congress.gov. Older CRS reports versions may be accessed from community supported sources.

Previously they were confidential. While not classified, they were exempt from FOIA due to Congressional privilege and therefore not readily accessible nor was their authenticity easily verifiable .

Predecessors

Other than a passing generic reference to “reports” in its statutory charter, CRS has no mandate for these products. They are created in the context of the overall mission of CRS to provide research support to Congress.

The Library of Congress, the home of CRS, had experimented during the 1940s with unrestricted publication Public Affairs Bulletins, which were produced by staff of the Legislative Reference Service, and devoted to various public policy issues. They were promoted by Archibald MacLeish, the Librarian of Congress, and, among other topics, addressed timely policy issues, such as American national defense. About 100 Public Affairs Bulletins were generated before congressional appropriators ended their production in 1951.

When the Congressional Research Service Review was launched in 1980, it continued for a little more than a decade before congressional appropriators, once again, invoked fiscal closure with the last issue published v. 13 #9 (Sept. 1992). The Review, which was published ten times a year and available to the public by subscription, offered original analytical articles, summaries highlighting CRS research products, and other kinds of assistance to the congressional community.

Copyright status

The New York Times has written that the reports contain

• neither classified information
• nor copyrighted information.

However, in a passage analyzing its own liability under United States copyright law, the CRS has written:

"CRS may incorporate preexisting material in its written responses to congressional requests. Although such material is often from public domain sources, in certain instances the material, appropriately credited, may be from copyrighted sources. To the extent that the material is copyrighted, CRS either:

• obtains permission for the use;
• considers its information-gathering function protected by the speech or debate clause;
• or believes that the use falls under the "fair use" doctrine of the Copyright Act as applied in the context of the legislative process."

and added

"Although CRS obtains permission to reproduce certain copyrighted works, the permissions are generally based on legislative use and the expectation that dissemination is limited to Members of Congress."

Thus, persons seeking public domain content in CRS reports can avoid infringing copyright by paying attention to the internal citations.

Appearance

CRS written work products fall into three major categories:(1) Congressionally Distributed Products Providing Research and Analysis on Legislative Issues, (2) Responses to Individual Members and Committees, and (3) Legislative Summaries, Digests, and Compilations.

Congressionally Distributed Products Providing Research and Analysis on Legislative Issues itself is broken into two subcategories: Reports for Congress and Congressional Distribution Memoranda.

Reports for Congress: CRS often prepares reports for Congress, analyses, or studies on specific policy issues of legislative interest. These reports clearly define issues in legislative contexts. Analysts define and explain technical terms and concepts, frame the issues in understandable and timely contexts, and provide appropriate, accurate, and valid quantitative data. The content of the report is summarized on its first page. These reports may be updated as events occur, or archived when they no longer reflect the current legislative agenda but can provide background and historical context.

Congressional Distribution Memoranda: Similar to the reports, memoranda are prepared when the interest of a relatively small number of congressional readers is anticipated or when an issue is sufficiently transient that CRS deems it inappropriate to include it in its list of products. Memoranda can be recast as a report if it becomes important to a larger congressional audience.

Responses to Individual Members and Committees: CRS staff provide custom services for Members and committees and their staff, tailored to address specific questions, and usually in a memorandum format. Written documents include Confidential Memoranda, Email Responses, and Briefing Books.

Confidential Memoranda: Confidential memoranda are prepared to meet a specific congressional request and are often designed for a congressional reader with a high level of expertise in a given topic. These memoranda are prepared for the use of the requester and are not distributed by CRS to a larger audience unless the requester gives permission.

Email Responses: Email responses to request for information can range from providing a statistic or a name to a short briefing to an interactive discussion on a variety of issues.

Briefing Books: Prepared for use by congressional delegations traveling abroad, these books are collections of material that support the specific purposes of a congressional trip. Briefing books can include a variety of materials, such as maps, selected products, and brief tailored written work, all of which contain background and current issues regarding U.S. relations with specific countries on the trip as well as questions Members may ask when meeting with government or other officials.

Legislative Summaries, Digests, and Compilations: Since 1935, the Legislative Analysis and Information Section (formerly the "Bill Digest" section) of CRS has had the statutory responsibility for preparation of authoritative, objective, nonpartisan summaries of introduced public bills and resolutions and the maintenance of historical legislative information. Detailed revised summaries are written to reflect changes made in the course of the legislative process. This CRS office also prepares titles, bill relationships, subject terms, and Congressional Record citations for debates, full text of measures, and Member introductory remarks.

Confidentiality of CRS Reports

The confidentiality status of Congressional Research Service reports, until September 18, 2018, was a matter of contention due to the lack of public access to research that was paid for by taxpayer money.

Congress had historically reserved to itself control over the dissemination of CRS products to the public on the principle that CRS, as an extension of congressional staff, works exclusively for the Congress: "dissemination is limited to Members of Congress." From 1952 until 2018 a provision was included in CRS annual appropriations acts requiring approval by one of its two congressional oversight committees for acts of "publication" by the CRS.

The limitation began in the House as a flat prohibition on publications by the Library of Congress using funds appropriated to the Legislative Reference Service (now CRS). In 1954 a provision was added providing for exception only with the approval of our oversight committees.

Unlocking CRS report access

• 1978: The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) issued a proposal under which CRS would have received access to the files of State research materials abstracted by the NCSL, and would have had the opportunity to order copies of desired items for use in answering congressional inquiries. In return, CRS would have provided the NCSL with periodic listings of CRS Reports (called "multiliths" at that time) and with only one copy of those CRS Reports which the NCSL requested. Under this proposal the NCSL also would have gained access to certain files from the Library of Congress's SCORPIO system, including CRS Issue Briefs. A congressional committee expressed the view that it was appropriate for Members of Congress, rather than CRS, to determine whether and to what extent various CRS products should be publicly disseminated. As a result, no action was taken to implement the proposed CRS-NCSL exchange.
• 1980: The Joint Committee on the Library released a policy statement regarding the publication of CRS written products: that said "the long-standing policy of confidentiality in the work of CRS for individual congressional clients should be maintained" and gave cost as part of its reason. A subsequent statement referred to "the legislative process and .. the Speech or Debate Clause of the Constitution.
• 1990: Facing a challenge, the Senate Majority Leader reiterated the importance of "protecting the work done by CRS in preparing communications to the Members and committees of Congress": and elaborated

by noting "A committee or Member of the Senate, of course, may determine to make available to the public a report or memorandum which the Congressional Research Service has provided to the committee or Senator... Nevertheless, ... it is important to protect the confidentiality of CRS's preparatory work in order to encourage the freest possible exploration by CRS..."

• 1998, 1999, 2001, 2003: Attempts were made by members of congress to pass legislation requiring the CRS to make its products available on a public web site. All failed to pass.

Some members of congress used committee websites to disseminate individual reports, beginning in 1998. Senator Tom Daschle (D-SD) was the first to act, putting almost 300 CRS products on his website. They were subsequently removed.

Representatives Shays and Mark Green (R-WI)—have placed many CRS products on their own websites in an attempt to make some CRS products available to the public.

"Reports are produced by the Congressional Research Service staff for the education of members of Congress," Kyle Anderson, a spokesman for the House Administration Committee, which has jurisdiction over the issue in the House, wrote in an e-mail message to the New York Times. "Just as other memos produced by staffers for members of Congress aren't made public, these are not."

This was countered by a clarification saying that the goal was the public release of only reports the research service produces, not the memorandums it also writes for members of Congress. (Former) Senator Joseph I. Lieberman said in an e-mail message to the New York Times. "These reports inform members of Congress and their staffs on a wide range of issues. The American people, who pay for these reports, should be able to learn from this same expert analysis."

Considerations debated

• Institutional issues details
• Legal issues details
• Risk of copyright infringement details

1997 CRS memorandum

In a December 1997 memorandum, the CRS summarized the "Legal Issues Presented by Proposals for the General Release of CRS Products to the Public":

• Speech and debate immunity: Reducing "substantial role in the legislative process". Such proposals might "cause the judiciary and administrative agencies to reassess their perception of CRS as playing a substantial role in the legislative process, and thereby might endanger a claim of [Speech and Debate Clause] immunity even in an instance in which CRS was fulfilling its legislative mission (e.g., by preparing a confidential memorandum for a Member on a pending bill.)"
• Libel, slander, and defamation. CRS also believes that slander or libel actions might occur more frequently if CRS products were put on the Internet, because more people would read CRS products and know of their existence.
• Confidentiality of CRS files. CRS believes that broader dissemination of CRS products would likely inspire more litigants who wish to obtain, for purposes of discovery, the files of CRS analysts. This might, CRS argues, cause the public release of correspondence between Members of Congress and CRS.
• Copyright infringement. CRS argues that it might be subject to claims of copyright infringement if CRS products were available on the Internet. CRS sometimes incorporates copyrighted work into its reports and products. (Elsewhere, the CRS notes that these inclusions are always "appropriately credited".)

Responses to the 1997 CRS memorandum

Memorandum of Gary Ruskin

On January 5, 1998, Gary Ruskin, Director of the Congressional Accountability Project, wrote a memorandum which disputed each of the arguments in the 1997 CRS memorandum}}

• Speech and debate immunity response

• Libel, slander, and defamation response

• Confidentiality of CRS files response

• Copyright infringement} response

Letter of Stanley M. Brand

On January 27, 1998, Stanley M. Brand, the former General Counsel to the House of Representatives, wrote a letter to Senator John McCain:

Concerning applicability of the Speech or Debate Clause, U.S. Const. art. I, 6, cl. 1, to certain CRS products which your bill would, if enacted, make available on the Internet, I believe that the concerns expressed in the CRS memorandum are either overstated, or the extent they are not, provide no basis for arguing that protection of CRS works will be weakened by your bill.

(See also his letter addressing a 2001 reintroduction of the same legislation.)

John McCain cited this letter on the Senate floor when he was proposing an amendment to the Legislative Branch Appropriations Act 1999 that would direct the Director of the Congressional Research Service to post `CRS Reports to Congress' and `CRS Issue Briefs' on the Internet. In this speech, he also noted:

I would like to point out that the Rules Committee has approved a decentralized system, where Senators can release CRS products on their private web pages. I see no difference between the release of CRS material on one hundred independent web pages and THOMAS, a Congressionally mandated web page. Both approaches should protect CRS equally.

I also urge my colleagues not to believe other arguments that CRS will suffer from a huge rise in workload from this amendment. It will require only two computer technicians to set up this web site, and keep it updated. CRS already has a process for deciding which information goes up on their web site for Members of Congress. This bill only asks that they duplicate this process for a public version of that web page. Also, we release paper copies of these products to our constituents every day without causing a great strain to CRS staff. Finally, I have the results of an analysis of state legislative research organizations that do work similar to CRS and post these products on the Internet. None of these organizations have complained of a huge increased workload from releasing their products to the Internet.

February 2003 POGO Report

The report, "Congressional Research Service Products: Taxpayers Should Have Easy Access", pointedly begins with an excerpt from the Library of Congress mission statement:

For a democracy to be dynamic and self-correcting, its governing institutions must be not only continuously accountable to the people but also solidly based on a body of knowledge that is both constantly expanding and available equally to those who legislate and to those who elect the legislators.

The report included a letter of September 3, 1999, from James Billington, the Librarian of Congress, responding to a letter from Ari Schwartz of the Center for Democracy and Technology, urging him to "make available on the Internet the reports of the Congressional Research Service".

The report addressed several of CRS's arguments.

1. Loss of Speech or Debate Clause Protections: Pogo argues that CRS's argument is undercut "by the fact that the GAO and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) have retained these protections while making their reports accessible and readily available to the public." It adds that "[o]utside experts familiar with the issue agree that CRS's constitutional immunity would be protected if it made its products available to the public", noting the afermentioned letter from Stan Brand, the former General Counsel to the House of Representatives (and counsel for the Project On Government Oversight), which concluded that "... nothing in [the bill to make CRS products publicly available] will alter or modify applicability of the Speech or Debate Clause protections to CRS products."

2. Risk of Copyright Infringement: Noting that CRS concedes in its aforementioned CRS Report that "[t]o the extent that the material is copyrighted, CRS either: obtains permission for the use; considers its information-gathering function protected by the speech or debate clause; or believes that the use falls under the 'fair use' doctrine of the Copyright Act as applied in the context of the legislative process", Pogo claims there should be no risk of copyright infringement. It adds that, "[s]hould CRS still be concerned about possible copyright infringement, Gary Ruskin, then-Director of the nonprofit Congressional Accountability Project, offered a number of solutions to counter the issue. CRS could ask permission to reproduce portions of copyrighted materials into reports and explain that these reports will be placed on the Internet. CRS could also abridge or eliminate the more lengthy passages which may fall outside the "fair use" claim before the reports are placed on the Internet."

3. Cost Considerations: Pogo claims that a pilot project initiated by Representative Christopher Shays (R-CT) that makes some CRS products publicly available demonstrates how inexpensive providing access to CRS products through the Internet can be. Representative Shays' website provides access to some CRS Issue Briefs, Short Reports, Long Reports, and Appropriations Reports. The pilot project cost only 60-80 hours of programming, 40-50 hours of testing, and the use of an additional existing server. A possibility other than establishing a new website would be to integrate as much information as possible from the CRS and LIS websites into the already-existing THOMAS system.

4 Peer Review of CRS Products: CRS states, "If CRS written products were routinely available on a wholesale basis to academic and other professional peers outside of Congress, CRS analysts might become more conscious of the need to address views, methods, disciplines, and expectations of non-congressional professional peers ..." (Appendix A, p. CRS-6)

What CRS states as a negative is seen by many as beneficial. Quality peer and public review can only serve to increase the quality of the works produced, thus better informing Congress and the public. GAO embraced the idea that the quality of its reports will be improved through peer and public review. For example, GAO sends its final draft reports to the agencies it has investigated and includes the agencies' comments in its final reports.

5. Member-Constituent Relations: Another of CRS's concerns is that open access to its products will obstruct the Member-constituent relationship. Daniel P. Mulhollan, Director of CRS states:

"[It] threatens the important relationship that Members have with their constituents. Historically, constituents have gone to Members of Congress when they have questions about legislation ... The wholesale direct dissemination of CRS products to the public would bypass this long standing relationship by denying constituents the benefit of their Members' additional insights, party viewpoints, or regional perspectives on CRS analysis."

According to Librarian of Congress Billington:

"Disclosure of CRS reports and issue briefs by Members and Committees—and greater use of the Internet to achieve such disclosure—is seen as reaching the proper balance between the public's desire for information on the issues before Congress, the preservation of CRS' role in the legislative process, and the protection of the Member's role in informing his/her constituents on their public policy concerns."

But public access to CRS material in no way obstructs Member-constituent relationships. It could, in fact, even improve that relationship. Well-informed constituents can only strengthen the democratic process by asking pertinent questions and offering educated opinions to their Members of Congress. One way of strengthening the relationship would be to establish a central database of CRS products to which Members of Congress could link, as is recommended in the bill to make CRS products publicly available. The Members would be serving their constituents by providing timely and unbiased analyses; the public would see their Members as trying to provide as much unbiased information as possible to keep their constituents well informed and able to participate in the governing process; and the public would have reason to frequent their Members' websites.

Furthermore, improving Member-constituent relationships is hardly a valid argument for creating a monopoly on information. Constituents are entitled to this information in a timely manner without the ideological screening of their Members of Congress, with whom they may not agree.

A final point which also undermines CRS's arguments against making its products public is the fact that the Government Printing Office (GPO) makes many old CRS reports available to the public through its federal depository libraries. Additionally, the Department of State makes current and archived copies of CRS reports, obtained from CRS, publicly available at their website.

2003 CRS internal memo

The memo states:

PLACING CRS PRODUCT LINKS ON CONGRESSIONAL WEB SITES

Statutory Restriction. The prohibition on publication of CRS products without oversight committee approval appears in the annual appropriations acts for the Legislative Branch. This provision is intended to preserve the role of CRS as a confidential resource solely available to the Congress. The appropriations acts, supplemented by congressional guidance that CRS has received over the years, and supported by judicial opinions, leaves to the Members and committees the decision whether, on a selective basis, to place CRS products in the public domain. Members have long made CRS products available to interested persons either directly, by inclusion in congressional publications, or through their own Web sites.

...

Key Risks of Wholesale Publication Without Selectivity. Legislation has been introduced in both houses (S.Res. 54 and H.R. 3630) that would authorize the wholesale public dissemination of CRS products, without selectivity, through Member and committee Web sites. Such an approach raises several policy and institutional concerns:

Impairment of Member Communication with Constituents – The danger of placing CRS, a support agency, in an intermediate position responding directly to constituents instead of preserving the direct relationship between constituents and their elected representatives. This threatens the dialog on policy issues between Members and their constituents that was envisioned by the Constitution.

Risk to Protection of Confidentiality – The current judicial and administrative perception of CRS might thereby be altered, putting at risk speech or debate protection for confidential work.

Change in Mission and Congressional Focus – Over time, CRS products might come to be written with a large public audience in mind and could no longer be focused solely on congressional needs.

Reduction in Service to Congress – Wholesale dissemination would inevitably generate a significant number of comments, questions, and concerns from the public regarding content. In addition to placing a burden on congressional offices, responding to such correspondence would require CRS to shift significant resources away from direct service to the Congress.

CRS Report, "The Congressional Research Service and the American Legislative Process" (2006/2008)

In the section entitled "Supporting a System of Shared Powers," the report notes that the staff of the U.S. Congress is much larger than in any other national legislature as a consequence of "the underlying nature of the American political system." In contrast to other parliamentary systems where there is "[n]ormally ... a collaborative relationship between the majority party or coalition in the parliament and the political leaders of the government ministries," under the United States Constitution "the powers of the federal government are distributed in a way that is intended and almost guaranteed to create competition and conflict between the legislative and executive branches." In support of the claim that the U.S. system of government, often characterized by a separation of powers, is "in fact ... a system of separate institutions sharing powers," the report details the ways in which "[t]he executive and legislative branches are distinctly separate institutions," as well as ways in which they share both legislative and executive powers; adding that "[t]he reason for this system of shared powers lies in both an historic mistrust of government power and a concern over the efficient administration of the law." The authors of the Constitution [felt that the] best way to protect against abuses of power was to provide for a system of "checks and balances", and that, although sharing powers can created administrative and deliberative inefficiencies, "having a government that its citizens can control and hold accountable was preferred in 1787, when the Constitution was written, to having one effectively controlled by either the executive or the legislative branch;" and "the fundamental framework of government under the Constitution remains unchanged today." The report adds that "in order for the sharing of power to protect against the abuse of power, more is required than the words of the Constitution."

Each branch of government must be able to protect its independence and assert its power effectively. In its continuing effort to preserve its constitutional authority and independence, Congress can suffer from an important competitive disadvantage: it often possesses less information and knowledge than the executive branch, which has more than 2.6 million employees.

If the executive branch could control what Congress knows, it might largely nullify Congress's independent exercise of its powers and its ability to oversee the exercise of executive powers. While Congress would remain independent of the executive branch in theory, it could become its captive in practice. This is an important reason why Congress has created permanent committees of the House and Senate with responsibility for studying issues, recommending legislation, and conducting oversight on the subjects assigned to them. In this way, Congress develops policy expertise among its own members and the staffs of its committees.

For the same reason, Congress created its three support agencies, including CRS, which are not subject to executive branch direction and which assure Congress of its own expert and independent assessments of national and international events and condition, its own studies of existing laws and programs, and its own analyses of the options for change.

In the section entitled "Nonpartisan Support for a Partisan Institution", the report adds "another respect in which the mandate of CRS reflects the nature of U.S. political institutions and the party system: although the House and Senate are organized by the Democratic and Republican parties and nearly all Members of Congress are affiliated with one party or the other, CRS is a nonpartisan institution. Its purpose is to inform, not to persuade. ... [i]t is in this environment that CRS exists to serve as a source of nonpartisan analysis and information."

In the section entitled "Serving All the Members of Congress", the report notes that "Representatives and Senators can be independent political decision-makers," and thus "[e]ach Member then needs direct access to a source of information and analysis to help him or her make these judgments — a source of accurate information and expert analysis that is independent and dependable and that has no interest in affecting the Member's decisions. To serve this need, the resources of CRS are available equally to each Representative and Senator without regard to party, position, or philosophy."

2007 CRS memo, "Distribution of CRS Reports to Non-Congressionals"

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/crs032007.pdf

On March 20, 2007, CRS Director David Mulhollan wrote an internal memo, "Distribution of CRS Products to Non-Congressionals". It describes how distribution controls are being "strengthened and clarified". "Following upon discussions held before the Research Policy Council, I have concluded that prior approval should now be required at the division or office level before products are distributed to members of the public. This policy is effective immediately."

Describing previous policy, the memo noted that "Products have generally not been made available to non-congressionals directly from CRS, with notable exceptions. For example, specifically identified individual products have been furnished by the Inquiry Section to executive and judicial branch offices and employees, and state and local government officials. The research divisions have also distributed products to such entities when it has been deemed to enhance CRS service to the Congress. Additionally, CRS products have been furnished by the Inquiry Section to members of the media and foreign embassies on request, but only if the requester can make specific reference to the product number or title of the report. Product requests can also originate from other non-congressional sources including individual researchers, corporations, law offices, private associations, libraries, law firms and publishers. The Inquiry Section typically declines these requests, and most often refers the caller to his or her congressional representative's office."

Analysts and research staff receive direct requests infrequently; however, "research divisions have on occasion both received and responded to product requests from these same public sources, and have, on occasion, provided products at their own initiative." Also, the Inquiry Section has also furnished CRS products to the media and foreign embassies but only when the requester has made specific reference to the product number or title of the report. Most formal requests from non-congressional sources come to the Service through the Inquiry Section, although many products are provided to these audiences through the informal, collégial dealings of CRS research staff with work contacts in their fields.

Mulhollan explained that "to avoid inconsistencies and to increase accountability," CRS policy now requires prior approval at the division level before products can be disseminated to non-congressionals. "Increased accountability and articulated standards for case-by-case determination are in the interest of both CRS and the Congress and are in conformity with publication policies put forward in the past."

Implementation: CRS policy on the distribution of CRS products to non-congressional audiences is as follows:

(1) U.S. governmental entities: CRS staff may provide appropriate congressional distribution products, upon request and upon prior approval of the assistant or associate director, deputy assistant or associate director, or office head, to agencies in the Executive Branch (including the White House) and the Judicial Branch, as well as state and local government officials when it can be demonstrated that the distribution benefits the Congress by assisting CRS in its work (e.g., reciprocity for information sharing). The Inquiry Section will accept such requests only when a product is specifically cited, either by number or title. Enforcement of Inquiry policy is the responsibility of the Associate Director for Congressional Affairs.

(2) Other non-governmental entities: CRS staff may, upon request and upon prior approval of the assistant or associate director, deputy assistant or associate director, or office head, provide congressional distribution products to academic institutions, professional associations, industry, non-governmental organizations, and other members of the public, but only when it can be clearly demonstrated that the distribution benefits the Congress by significantly assisting CRS in its work (e.g., peer review or expert opinion). Inquiry will continue to decline such requests under the oversight of the Associate Director for Congressional Affairs.

(3) The Media: Products may only be provided to the media by the Inquiry Section if the media requester specifically identifies the product by product number or title. Inquiry dissemination will be monitored by the Associate Director for Congressional Affairs. Divisions, analysts, and research staff and other CRS staff outside of the Inquiry Section who receive requests must obtain the approval of the assistant or associate director, deputy assistant or associate director, or office head prior to dissemination, and distribution should occur only when it is clearly demonstrated that such sharing benefits the Congress by providing value to CRS.

(4) Foreign governments: The Inquiry Section may provide congressional distribution products in response to requests from foreign embassies when the requester provides either the title or citation to the product. Enforcement of this policy is the responsibility of the Associate Director for Congressional Affairs. CRS staff may not furnish products to foreign government entities without prior approval of the assistant or associate director, deputy assistant or associate director, or office head, and distribution should only occur when it is clearly demonstrated that such sharing benefits the Congress by providing value to CRS. Following approval, the assistant director will comply with existing Library of Congress security guidelines for reporting foreign contacts.

April 18, 2007 memo, "Access to CRS Reports"

CRS Director David Mulhollan wrote an internal memo:

What is the rationale for CRS providing its work solely to the Congress? Three broad concerns go to the heart of the existing policy: impairment of the performance of Members' representational role, risk to confidentiality, and impact on the mission and congressional focus that characterizes our efforts. These issues also inform our policies on furnishing products to individuals outside Congress and our guidelines on staff interactions with the media.

...

Institutional Concerns Regarding Public Access

Confidentiality. The "Speech or Debate" clause of the Constitution, referenced in the above congressional resolutions, states that "for any Speech or Debate in either House, [Members] shall not be questioned in any other Place." While this clause has been interpreted to grant broad legal immunity to Members and their aides for statements made during the course of debate or when activity occurs in the performance of "legislative acts," it has been made clear in recent years that the protection does not extend to representational responsibilities generally. The protection has been extended to areas where it has been considered necessary to prevent impairment of deliberations and other legitimate legislative activities. Of major concern here has been the extent to which a policy permitting significant public dissemination of our products might render the protection that our support to Members currently enjoys under the umbrella of this constitutional provision inapplicable to congressional communications with CRS. Currently, CRS products prepared for the Congress are considered to be protected from scrutiny by third parties without permission of the Congress or the Member for whom the work was prepared. Stated simply, the concern in this regard is that if the Service were to become generally known to frequently distribute products directly to the general public—and thereby to be seen more as a purveyor of products to the public rather than as adjunct staff to Congress—we might be subject to "questioning" (i.e., litigation, subpoena, or other demand for production of documents) regarding our work that would do serious harm to our confidential working relationship with our congressional clients.

Although the Courts have recognized the propriety of congressional activities intended to inform the general public, this informing function has been held to be outside the scope of so-called speech or debate immunity. Recent judicial narrowing of the scope of the application of this protection has exacerbated the potential threat to confidentiality. Case law supports the conclusion that widespread dissemination of products to the general public would likely be viewed by the courts as an exercise of Congress' representational or informing function for which speech or debate immunity would not attach. While an effort could be made to distinguish CRS confidential memoranda from our congressional distribution reports, the potential for damage to speech or debate protection claims for any CRS products would potentially still be significant. Under proposals for wholesale distribution of CRS products to the public, those engaged in such distribution—CRS staff, congressional staff, or Members—might be vulnerable to lawsuits seeking release of CRS files, damages, injunctions, etc. More likely—and more importantly for future relations between CRS and Congress—would be an erosion over time of the idea that CRS works solely for the Congress and that our analysts operate as a confidential staff resource to Members and committees.

Congressional Focus and Resource Issues. Public expectations of access could have significant cost implications for CRS—both in responding to requests and in answering public concerns regarding products provided. Widespread public access to CRS products could cause analysts to become more conscious of the need to address views, methods, disciplines, and expectations of a non-congressional audience, and thereby shift the focus of our products away from their current emphasis on the congressional audience. As a result, our congressional clients, recognizing such a change in the content and protection afforded our work, would either request more confidential memoranda, which are available only to the requester, or, more significantly, no longer have confidence in CRS ' ability to truly serve as their adjunct staff. As we know, memoranda are more resource intensive to prepare than products which are available for distribution to all Members and committees and take advantage of economies of scale. Writing for a public audience also has the potential to alter the extent to which CRS products can rely on a certain level of knowledge on the part of the reader, complicating the analyst's task and perhaps increasing the length of products. There is also the potential for incurring significant costs in any process of creating an effective system for making CRS work available to the public, the monitoring of products for necessary redaction, and the cost of a likely increase in the volume of requests for tailored individual requests for written products that are not made available to the public.

Recent Public Access Issues

Policy on Distribution Outside the Congressional Community. In keeping with the policies outlined above, CRS has generally refrained from making its products directly available to non-congressional requesters, save for a few exceptions based on principles of reciprocity. For example, research divisions have furnished individual products to Executive Branch and Judicial Branch offices and employees, state and local government officials, and representatives of foreign government entities when it has been deemed to enhance CRS service to the Congress. Analysts occasionally respond to requests for products from individual researchers, corporations, law offices, private associations, libraries, law firms, and publishers where a collégial exchange of information is deemed to benefit our work.

With limitations, on occasion CRS also furnishes CRS products to the media and foreign embassies for similar reasons.

I recently polled the divisions on their practices with respect to furnishing products to individuals and organizations not in the congressional community. As a result of the varying practices that were revealed, I restated the CRS policy on distribution of our products to such entities, articulating the need for agreement on standards across the Service to ensure consistency, to better appraise our current practices, and to be better able to articulate the standard of the Service in this regard when asked. This policy looks specifically at the sharing of our products with government entities (both federal, state, and local), with public organizations, institutions, and individuals, with the media, and with foreign embassies.

Clearly, this policy is itself an outgrowth of the publications policy, reflecting the fact that our work is intended for Congress, and it is the Congress that decides when further dissemination is appropriate. Adherence to consistent and articulated standards for sharing with those outside the congressional community is important to our efforts to maintain our confidential relationship with Congress and to any future need to enforce restrictions. Our congressional overseers would expect no less of us. Despite misunderstanding fueled by mis-characterization by the press and others, this policy restatement does not further prohibit dissemination of products under certain circumstances, but simply requires accounting of the practices via division notice and approval.

The Media. I also recently updated the policy on interacting with the media. In doing so, I emphasized that the risks to individual staff members and to CRS as a whole are greater with today's media because of the instant dissemination of news, the competition among media outlets, and the lack of control over quotation, its context and subsequent appearance elsewhere. The updated policy retains the basic requirement that has been a part of the CRS media policy since its inception: "staff must adhere to the basic tenets of CRS, respecting the confidential nature of our work for Congress and the requirements of objectivity, non-partisanship and non-advocacy whenever they speak to the media on matters relating to their work." The policy also provides that all on-the-record media interactions be reported to division/office management, as was urged under the former policy. It describes a role for the Office of Communications in assisting staff in determining if speaking with the media is advisable, and in following up on questions of the accuracy of reporting on staff comments or on CRS products.

The Internet and CRS Products. We are all aware of the proliferation of Internet sites that make CRS products available—some for a fee, some free of charge. In this electronic age it is obviously very difficult to control access to our congressional distribution products that appear on our own Web Site, even with restricted access to that site. Some sites present our products in searchable form, some not. Some are relatively complete in their coverage, while others focus on particular subject areas. Some publishers have even published CRS reports as hard copy books without permission of the author, often in out-of-date and excerpted form that runs the risk of misleading the reader. What they all have in common is that they make these products available without CRS approval. The fact that our work—the product of a government entity—is not copyrighted, makes it legally impossible to prohibit such use. The presence of these access points for our products, however, does not diminish the need for CRS to carefully hew to our obligation not to be involved in public distribution activities.

Conclusion

In part through added exposure, especially through online sources, CRS products have come to be widely cited as authoritative, timely, and accurate sources of information on public policy issues of the day. Audiences, including policy makers, industry leaders, professors, and students, have viewed our products as trusted and valued sources of information. However, over the years we have preserved CRS ' confidential relationship with the Congress by severely restricting access to our products as a general policy. Any relaxation of restrictions on dissemination to the public would be in conflict with the history of legislative provisions, policy statements and communications on the issue. These pronouncements have had the effect of restricting the disclosure or publication of CRS materials by emphasizing that communications from the Service to Congress are constitutionally protected, confidential, and subject to the custody and control of the Congress. The same rationales have been relied upon to limit access to the CRS Web Site to congressional users. I am convinced—to borrow the sound bite I noted at the beginning—that the true value of CRS is as a resource devoted solely to the needs of Congress. In that way, the taxpayers realize the utmost value for their "investment." Our staff is also better able to maintain its reputation for objective, authoritative and advocacy-free expertise devoted to an informed National legislature.

The reasons for limiting public dissemination of our work can be summarized as follows. First, there is a danger that placing CRS, a legislative support agency, in an intermediate position, responding directly to constituents as members of the public, would threaten the dialog on policy issues between Members and their constituents that was envisioned by the Constitution as the essence of the representational role of Members.

Leaving dissemination of CRS products to the discretion of Members avoids placing a "faceless bureaucracy" between constituents and their elected representative. Second, the current judicial and administrative perception of CRS as "adjunct staff of the Congress might be altered if CRS were seen as speaking directly to the public, putting at risk Speech or Debate Clause constitutional protections afforded the confidential work performed by this agency. To date, litigation demands for testimony of CRS employees and production of documents used in preparing memoranda and reports for the Congress have been quashed.

And third, if CRS products were routinely disseminated broadly to the public, over time these products might come to be written with a large public audience in mind and would no longer be focused solely on congressional needs. In addition to placing a burden on congressional offices asked to respond or comment on CRS work, responding to the inevitable questions posed by the public to CRS would likely require the Service to shift significant resources away from direct service to the Congress in order to meet this demand.

Other related policies—dissemination of products to those outside the congressional community and the media policy—flow from similar principles. I believe CRS would be a very different place and suffer a diminution in its role as adjunct staff to Congress were it not for the various restrictions we place on product distribution and staff interaction with the press. And, despite the somewhat hyperbolic reaction of some, there is little new in the recently announced policies nor anything particularly onerous. The majority of our seasoned staff abide by these regulations and understand and are comfortable with the principles that underlie them. Those who have joined CRS in the last few years must also become acculturated in these practices and understand their origin and rationale.

CRS websites

Current Members of Congress and their offices may access the CRS website (www.crs.gov) and CRS's Legislative Information Service (LIS) website (www.congress.gov). The two sites are the most comprehensive and integrated sources of information regarding workings of the federal government, and are arguably the best sources of information regarding the legislative process of the United States.

These sites provide all information necessary to become informed about any aspect of government. They also have the information needed to keep up-to-the-minute on most legislation including information from past bills similar to the current legislation; historical information about the legislation; biographical data about the Members who introduced it; the ability to track the legislation as it moves through committee hearings to the Floor; and links to information about the legislation in the Congressional Record, Floor and committee schedule information, and the Federal Register.

Neither of these websites is available to the public. In order to prevent public access to the websites, CRS has erected an elaborate firewall to keep the public out. Taxpayers are only allowed access to THOMAS (thomas.loc.gov). In fact, when the public tries to access the LIS, they are automatically forwarded to THOMAS without warning.

www.crs.gov. The CRS website provides CRS publications on current legislative issues, electronic briefing books, information on the legislative and budget processes, a searchable database of all CRS products, and other information about Congressional procedures and activities.

www.congress.gov. The LIS website is specifically designed to track legislation and legislative activity. According to the CRS, "The LIS ... provides bill summary and status, full text of legislation and public laws, full text of committee reports, hearings, and other documents, and the Congressional Record for the current and earlier Congresses. The system also gives (and is searchable by) committee, sponsorship, and cosponsorship; identification of identical bills; and other information." The LIS varies substantially from the system which is available to the public at the Library of Congress' THOMAS website (thomas.loc.gov). In fact, CRS has a special page detailing the enhanced capabilities of the restricted LIS website over the public THOMAS website.

The following is CRS's comparison of the LIS (www.congress.gov) with THOMAS (thomas.loc.gov):

Service	Legislative Information System	Thomas
Website	www.congress.gov	thomas.loc.gov
Who Can Use It	Available to the public. (Previously only available to Congress, including state and district offices, and legislative support agencies. Some features listed below may no longer be available.)	Available to the public.
Best Used For	Finding the most complete legislative information for congressional staff or for a Member; obtaining information, using databases, and linking to pages that are not available to the public on THOMAS. Should not be used for making links from Member or committee home page (since the public cannot access LIS).	Working with constituents; making links from Member or committee home pages; making printouts that are to be sent to constituents.
Commercial Databases	Links to databases that have been licensed for use by House and Senate staff, such as National Journal and the AP Newswire. Links from the status of a bill to National Journal markups.	No links to commercial databases.
CRS Reports	Links from Bill Summary & Status display to CRS reports related to a bill. Ability to search all CRS reports via the CRS Home Page; these products can be searched, displayed, and printed.	No CRS reports are available to the public.
Restricted links	Links to restricted Capitol Hill Web sites such as the House Intranet, Senate Webster, and Senate amendment tracking system.	No links to restricted Capitol Hill Web sites.
Floor & Committee Schedule Information	Links to Capitol Hill and outside sources of floor and committee schedule information, selected to be of most use to congressional staff.	Minimal links to floor and committee schedule information.
Advanced search capabilities	Special advanced search capabilities, providing Boolean searching (and, or, not), word proximity searching (quotes to indicate phrases, adj/l, near/l), and other features.	Only basic search capabilities.
Saved searches and email alerts	The ability to save searches and to request daily email alerts of new items added to databases that meet the search criteria.	No ability to save searches or request email alerts.

Written work-product

Document types include CRS Reports, appropriations Reports (usually released as a Long Report), and Congressional distribution memoranda.

CRS Reports

The most commonly requested CRS product is the general congressional distribution reports, known as "CRS Reports". The purpose of a report is to clearly define the issue in the legislative context. The types of CRS reports include Issue Briefs (IB), Research Memos (RM), and Reports, which appear in both Short (RS) and Long (RL) formats.

Other than a passing generic reference to "reports" in its statutory charter, CRS has no mandate for these products. They are created in the context of the overall mission of CRS to provide research support to Congress.

The reports may take many forms, including policy analysis, economic studies, statistical reviews, and legal analyses.

CRS reports are considered in-depth, accurate, objective, and timely, and topped the list of the "10 Most-Wanted Government Documents" survey by the Center for Democracy and Technology in 1996.

Public access to CRS Reports

Prior to September 2018 CRS products were only made directly available to members of Congress, Congressional committees, and CRS's sister agencies (CBO and GAO) through the internal CRS Web system. As of September 18th 2018 the official US government website crsreports.congress.gov.

See also

• Federal Research Division

External links

• Official website
• Congressional Research Service official website
• Perform a search within Congressional Research Service reports
• EveryCRSReport.com is a free republishing project by "Demand Progress. "Started in 2016 with support from anonymous members of Congress EveryCRSReport.com has received every new report and republished them for free public access."
• Internet Archive collection of sites that publish CRS reports: harvests include OpenCRS (free access to many CRS reports), UNT, FAS, Thurgood Marshall Law Library and others.
• Source Watch – A website about CRS

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