5.2 Accessing the History of a Bill

You may access the history of any Senate or Assembly bill that is before the legislature, or that was before the legislature in the last session.

The Bill History is a report prepared separately for each bill and which itemizes in chronological order the significant action taken on the bill as it progresses through the legislature. Typical events noted in the Bill History are:

Billid, Author, and Topic
Date Introduced
Date of first day in print -- may be heard 30 days later
Date referred to committee
Date set for committee hearing
Date of any rule waivers
Date from committee with committee vote and recommendation
Date read second time
Date of any floor actions
Date transferred to the other house
--- similar dates for action in the other house ---
Date sent to Governor
Date vetoed or signed by the Governor
Date chaptered

Accessing The Documents

Since the Bill History contains no amendment notations, the file HISTORY.WRI is essentially identical to HISTORY.TXT. Unless you have some good reason to select the ".WRI" version you should probably just select the ".TXT" version. See Section 5.1 for more information on the differences between the ".WRI" format files and the ".TXT" format files.

WWW (World Wide Web)

Direct your Web Browser to: URL: http:://www.sen.ca.gov/

Select: Search Bill Text

Then uner "Search by Bill Number" enter the bill_id in the blank labelled "Enter the bill number to search for ", and then click on "Search for Bill Number".

Gopher

"Point" your Gopher to: Gopher gopher.sen.ca.gov

If your Gopher does not have an option to point it to particular domain references, then locate the gopher menu option "Gopher Jewels" (Nearly every Gopher is set up to reference "Gopher Jewels" by some means). Then follow the gopher menus via "Government" and "State Government" to "California Legislature Gopher".

From the Senate Root Menu,

Select: Access bill text, analyses, codes, etc./
Then Select: Type in a Bill-ID (e.g. SB_1234) for list from 1995..1996 session
OR Select: Type in a Bill-ID (e.g. SB_1234) for list from 1993..1994 session

You will be promted to type in a billid. Just type in the bill-id as described in the section above entitled "Bill ID", however, it is not necessary to include the bill-type suffix denoting an extraordinary session

Example: SB 1

The result is an acknowledment menu similar to:

1. Senate bill 1 (current session)/
2. Senate bill 1 (95/96 extraordinary session 1)/
3. Senate bill 1 (95/96 extraordinary session 2)/

Select one of those to see a menu presenting all of the documents available for the bill. Sample:

Senate bill 1 (95/96 extraordinary session)
1. Analysis, SBX1 1, Asm. Local Government committee as of 1995-02-14..
2. Analysis, SBX1 1, Sen. Floor Session as of 1995-01-25 (Text) [6KB]
3. Analysis, SBX1 1, Sen. Transp. & Pub.Safety Mgt. committee as of 1..
4. History, SBX1 1, as of 1995-03-24 (Text)
5. Status, SBX1 1, as of 1995-03-29 (Text)
6. Text, SBX1 1, Current Amended 1995-01-25 (Text) [5KB]
7. Text, SBX1 1, Current Amended 1995-02-23 (Text) [5KB]
8. Text, SBX1 1, Current Amended 1995-03-23 (Text) [5KB]
9. Text, SBX1 1, Introduced 1995-01-23 (Text) [4KB]
10. Vote, SBX1 1, Asm. Local Government committee as of 1995-02-15 (Te..
11. Vote, SBX1 1, Sen. Floor Session (Motion 8) as of 995-01-26 (Text..
12. Vote, SBX1 1, Sen. Transp. & Pub.Safety Mgt. committee as of 1995-..
13. Analysis, SBX1 1, Asm. Local Government committee as of 1995-02-14 ..
14. Analysis, SBX1 1, Sen. Floor Session as of 1995-01-25 (MS Write) [7..
15. Analysis, SBX1 1, Sen. Transp. & Pub.Safety Mgt. committee as of 19..
16. History, SBX1 1, as of 1995-03-24 (MS Write)
17. Status, SBX1 1, as of 1995-03-29 (MS Write)
18. Text, SBX1 1, Amended 1995-01-25 (MS Write) [5KB]
19. Text, SBX1 1, Amended 1995-02-23 (MS Write) [5KB]
20. Text, SBX1 1, Amended 1995-03-23 (MS Write) [6KB]
21. Text, SBX1 1, Introduced 1995-01-23 (MS Write) [5KB]
22. Vote, SBX1 1, Asm. Local Government committee as of 1995-02-15 (MS ..
23. Vote, SBX1 1, Sen. Floor Session (Motion 8) as of 1995-01-26 (MS Wr..
24. Vote, SBX1 1, Sen. Transp. & Pub.Safety Mgt. committee as of 1995-0..

E-Mail

Send your request for information via E-Mail as follows (you my include any number of requests in a single e-mail):
Mail to: senate-news@sen.ca.gov
Subject: doesn't matter
Text:
get bill HISTORY.TXT
Example:
Mail to: senate-news@sen.ca.gov
Subject: doesn't matter
Text:
get bill SB_1 HISTORY.TXT
Send Comments or Questions via E-Mail to: News.Editor@sen.ca.gov