Thank you! Bill data from the Congressional API stops at around 1972 (this site stopping at 1975 over 1972 is somewhat arbitrary). Much of our modern visibility into Congress (e.g. C-SPAN and detailed publication of bill actions) emerged as a fallout of Watergate. Before that you can sometimes reverse engineer bills from what ultimately became law, but metadata / action details are sparse. Some earlier Congresses do have actions available, and coverage is gradually being expanded as far as I can tell.
I’d like to have full coverage eventually. A complete Executive Order history exists via the UCSB American Presidency Project, but for now I’ve only uploaded what’s available from the Federal Register.
My next focus is adding donations and net-worth data to legislator pages. After that I’d like to add some form of commenting and voting to make the site more interactive around currently in progress legislation.
This is actually my second attempt at the UI :) I like it, but I’m definitely biased and have lost track of what may be confusing to new users. Open to any feedback!
Good luck with the upgrades! This looks like a useful tool.
I noticed two things immediately about the UI: the complete absence of rounded rects [1] (which seem to be everywhere, except HN), and the embeded windows (e.g. for Executive orders) with their own scroll bars and window controls. These two things different than my (not-so-educated) view of the rest of the web and took me a second to get used to.
I once worked with a design lead who had a rule about no rounded borders so maybe that rubbed off on me for better or worse. Fun link on the history of it :)
It is interesting!
Is the data not as easy to parse prior to 1975? Or why did you stop there?
What else would you like to do with this? Are there other filters you would like to add? Do you like the UI?
Thank you! Bill data from the Congressional API stops at around 1972 (this site stopping at 1975 over 1972 is somewhat arbitrary). Much of our modern visibility into Congress (e.g. C-SPAN and detailed publication of bill actions) emerged as a fallout of Watergate. Before that you can sometimes reverse engineer bills from what ultimately became law, but metadata / action details are sparse. Some earlier Congresses do have actions available, and coverage is gradually being expanded as far as I can tell.
I’d like to have full coverage eventually. A complete Executive Order history exists via the UCSB American Presidency Project, but for now I’ve only uploaded what’s available from the Federal Register.
My next focus is adding donations and net-worth data to legislator pages. After that I’d like to add some form of commenting and voting to make the site more interactive around currently in progress legislation.
This is actually my second attempt at the UI :) I like it, but I’m definitely biased and have lost track of what may be confusing to new users. Open to any feedback!
Good luck with the upgrades! This looks like a useful tool.
I noticed two things immediately about the UI: the complete absence of rounded rects [1] (which seem to be everywhere, except HN), and the embeded windows (e.g. for Executive orders) with their own scroll bars and window controls. These two things different than my (not-so-educated) view of the rest of the web and took me a second to get used to.
I hope you continue to improve the site!
[1] https://www.folklore.org/Round_Rects_Are_Everywhere.html
Thanks for engaging I appreciate it!
I once worked with a design lead who had a rule about no rounded borders so maybe that rubbed off on me for better or worse. Fun link on the history of it :)