Publication Practices for Transparent Government: Rating the Congress

Performance_Report

End: 2011-09-23, Publication: 2011-10-14

Source: http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/congress-on-transparency-needs-improvement/

How well can the Internet access data about Congress' work? In consultation with transparency experts, the Cato Institute's director of information policy studies, Jim Harper, rated how Congress publishes key legislative data in terms of authoritative sourcing, availability, machine-discoverability, and machine-readability.

These criteria envision a world where there is one authoritative source for each category of information. Unfortunately, today's congressional data are published by a lot of sources that have grown up haphazardly. There might even be some sources we don't know about. Future grades will undoubtedly reflect improvements in what researchers, reporters, websites, and the public at large can see and use, aided by their computers.

Content

Visions

Missions

Values

1: Office Holders

2: Committees and Subcommittees

3: Meetings of House, Senate, and Committees

4: Meeting Records

5: Committee Reports

6: Bills

7: Amendments

8: Motions

9: Decisions

10: Votes

11: Communications (Inter- and Intra-Branch)