Sustainable Business: Transactions & Strategy (JURI 5667): Government Sites

Statutes -The U.S. Code is official but researchers prefer the U.S. Code Annotated or U.S. Code Service because they contain helpful annotations and are published in a more timely manner.

• U.S. Code

Legislative Materials - If you’re trying to learn something about a particular piece of legislation, one of the most important documents to look at is the Committee Report. These resources also have the various versions of bills and documents submitted by committee witnesses.

• ProQuest Congressional (database provided by University System of Georgia)
• ProQuest Legislative Insight (database provided by the Law Library)
• Congress.gov (website from the Library of Congress)
• U.S. Congressional Serial Set (database provided by the Law Library)

Administrative Agencies - One of the things you will generally not find on the agency web sites are any regulations promulgated by the agency. Those are found in the Code of Federal Regualtions (CFR). You can link to the CFR online through the GPO's Federal Digital System (FDSys). The GPO is the Government Printing Office, the official publisher, so to speak, of the government. As the tagline on FDSys says, "America's Authentic Government Information".

• USA.gov - This site is more about answering questions about the government and providing links for citizens. There is a convenient list of government agencies.
• FedWorld - This site is maintained by the National Technical Information Service and focuses on providing access to the information produced by the government.
• U.S. Department of Energy, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy - lots of statistics and reports
• U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)
  • Regulatory Barriers Clearinghouse - Suppors state and local organizations looking for information about the development, maintenance, and cost of afforadable housing.
• U.S. Department of Transportation
  • Federal Highway Administration (FHA), Bicycle & Pedestrian Program
  • Federal Transit Administration, Environmental Analysis & Review - environmental review process under NEPA
• U.S. Global Change Research Program - cooperative effort between departments and agencies
• U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
  • A-Z Subject Index
  • Laws and Regulations
  • Office of Environmental Justice

Georgia - Georgia.gov is the official web site for the state of Georgia

The state government, like the federal government, is divided into three branches:

• Executive branch (Governor and administrative agencies) > Regulations
  • The rules and regulations from the state agencies
• Legislative branch (House and Senate) > Statutes
  • The Official Code of Georgia (OCGA) is at the site for the Georgia General Assembly.
• Judicial branch (Courts) > Cases
  • Both the Supreme Court and the Court of Appeals have web sites with some of their opinions. LexisNexis Academic  has the full body of court opinions and better keyword searching.
  • Print-  available in the main reading room of the Law Library
    • The official print source for the opinions of the Georgia Supreme Court is the Georgia Reports (Ga.)
    • The official print source for the opinions of the Court of Appeals is the Georgia Appeals Reports (Ga. App.)
    • The opinions of both courts are also published in the unofficial South Eastern Reporter (S.E., S.E.2d), which is referred to as a regional reporter.
• Pay attention to how far back the databases go and how frequently or quickly they are updated.

Local Government

• General Code's eCode online municipal codes
• Municode Code Library