View source for Wikipedia talk:WikiProject U.S. Congress

A resource for political actions, in addition to normal history sources, is the page facimilies of the ''Statutes at Large'' volumes available at the Library of Congress.  I took dates from there for statehood.  I don't know what other sources say.  The second Congress did not convene until the Autumn of 1791. [[User:BobCMU76|BobCMU76]] 12:12 May 11, 2003 (UTC)

[http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lwsl.html Statutes at Large]
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The pages for each Congress should mention promimently when the Congress sat. I would suggest at the top of the page. [[User:Rmhermen|Rmhermen]] 22:52 May 12, 2003 (UTC)

:The session dates are available [http://www.senate.gov/reference/congresses1.pdf here].  Locations are not shown, The third session of the first congress met in Phila. I believe the second session of the sixth congress first met in D.C. [[User:BobCMU76|BobCMU76]] 11:41 May 14, 2003 (UTC)

== session dates vs. period served ==

OK, I'm a little confused about how to describe the dates that a member of Congress served, particularly for pre-1934 Congesses. The Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress seems to do it two ways. For example, I'm looking at the entry for Lucius Lyon. Here [http://bioguide.congress.gov/biosearch/biosearch1.asp] the 23rd Congress is listed as 1833-1834. But here [http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=L000544] the dates are given as March 4, 1833-March 3, 1835. So should I write that he served from 1833-1834 or from 1833-1835? I suppose I could include the exact dates, but that seems to me a bit tedious for persons elected to multiple terms. 
[[User:Bkonrad|Bkonrad]] | [[User talk:Bkonrad|Talk]] 16:23, 16 Mar 2004 (UTC)

:The bioguide simplifies things because, today, congresses begin and end on January 3. In the past, it was early March. When it says the 23rd congress is 1833-1834, it means March 1833-March 1835. He should certainly be listed as serving from 33 to 35. Personally, I don't think exact dates are needed unless the person started or ended their term at a date other than the proper start-end date, like if they resigned, died, appointed or contested the election. --[[User:Golbez|Golbez]] 14:46, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)

== Tables ==
I've joined this because of the work I've been doing on the tables of state delegations; good examples at [[US Congressional Delegations from Kentucky]] and [[US Congressional Delegations from Florida]]. These could be a very useful cross-reference tool. These list who served in what congress from a particular state; the #th Congress articles list who served from what state in a particular congress. --[[User:Golbez|Golbez]] 14:46, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)

== Congregator ==
I've been playing around with a program I wrote (called congregator) to extract data from pages at [http://bioguide.congress.gov/biosearch/biosearch.asp].  I created a page for the [[Thirty-second_United_States_Congress]] as a trial run and then went through and checked the links.  More to come.[[User:K4 pacific|K4 pacific]] 03:23, 28 Aug 2004 (UTC)

:Be warned - the BioGuide's database is sometimes wrong. I typically run into 1-2 errors per state, where it lists someone in the wrong congress, or doesn't list them in the proper congress. (The bios themselves are fine, but the database linking them together is not) --[[User:Golbez|Golbez]] 05:24, Aug 28, 2004 (UTC)

::Actually, I've found that the bios are not 100% reliable either. Usually just small errors, but enough to make double-checking things worthwhile. [[User:Bkonrad|{{User:Bkonrad/sig}}]] 11:36, 28 Aug 2004 (UTC) PS, re: K4 pacific's program--I think it's great--just add a note at the top that the data was automatically extracted and needs to be verified. [[User:Bkonrad|{{User:Bkonrad/sig}}]] 11:39, 28 Aug 2004 (UTC)

:Your script is linking to the Georgia disambiguation page, no the state. I have fixed the [[Thirty-second_United_States_Congress]] page, but your script needs tweaking. [[User:Susvolans|Susvolans]] 13:00, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)