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The U.S. Government: Legislative Branch category in the Yahoo! Directory leads straight to a massive source of up-to-date information about Congress. The THOMAS: Legislative Information on the Internet site is a service of the U.S. Congressional Library. It's named for the country's third president, Thomas Jefferson, and links to, among other things, roll call votes dating back to 1990 in the House and 1989 in the Senate. On the House roll call votes page, you'll find details about how the 107th Congress, 2nd Session voted in 2002, as well as in past votes. Click
on the number in the "Roll" column to go directly to the voting outcome. For example, H.R. 5710, the resolution to establish a Department of Homeland Security, passed with 237 "yeas" and had 177 "nays." Scroll through the page to see the names of Congresspeople who voted for and against, as well as those who didn't vote. Political parties are denoted with different type styles. Senate roll call votes are similarly organized. The page for the 107th Congress, 2nd Session lists legislation, and voting results are linked in the "Vote" column. Pages for individual bills display a vote summary and also sort votes by senator's name, vote position, and home state. Project Vote Smart: Congress Track will help you find out how your Congressional representatives voted on important topics. On the Current Members of Congress page, enter the nine-digit ZIP code for your home address (you can find it on the U.S. Postal Service site) and click "Go." The results page lists the people who represent your
state and district in Congress. Click on a representative's name, and you can access his or her voting record on the following biography page (the link is in the upper-right corner). Major votes for your Congressperson are categorized alphabetically by topic. Underneath the topic headings, you'll find the years in which this Congressperson voted, and you can click on the different years to read summaries of the legislation, final vote, and your Congressperson's vote in bold text.
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