The Freedom of Information Act gives citizens the right to request information from federal government agencies and the web portal,  FOIA.gov,  offers data and reports on the requests obtained and processed by the administrative agencies. Users of FOIA.gov can also create their own reports on the processing time, fee waivers and backlog of requests by agency for Fiscal Years 2008 through 2011.

The FOIA.gov web portal, created by the Department of Justice Office of Information Policy, also provides a direct link to the FOIA contacts by executive agency and  features detailed guidance on how and where to make a FOIA request.

Three days of Supreme Court arguments on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act begin on March 26, 2012.

Copies of the briefs are available from the Supreme Court's website at http://www.supremecourt.gov/docket/PPAACA.aspx.

Transcripts of the hearings will be available at the end of each day at http://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcripts.aspx.

On Friday, March 30, audio recordings of the hearings should be available at http://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_audio.aspx. It is possible, due to the public interest in these cases, that the audio recordings may be posted earlier. 

"Since its founding in 1974, the Congressional Budget Office has produced independent, nonpartisan, timely analysis of economic and budgetary issues to support the Congressional budget process."  This analysis is now more accessible on the Congressional Budget Office's new website.  Under the "Topics" tab, researchers can search by topics such as health care, finance and national security, by Congress and by publication type such as background paper, testimony, or cost estimate.

The CBO is most known for the cost estimates they produce to show how a proposed Congressional bill would affect spending or revenues in the federal buget. On the new website, the "Cost Estimate" tab allows users to search by topic and Congress, but also by bill number, committee and date.

To monitor the newly released analyses, users can sign up for an RSS feed.  Georgetown Law Library's Policy Research Guide identifies other resources to follow when researching policy issues.

The complete version of President Obama's FY 2013 Budget of the United States Government is available on FDsys.gov.  New this year, is the mobile app featuring the budget message of the President, departmental funding highlights and summary tables.

A previous Due Process post describes how the federal budget process works. Feel free to consult a reference librarian if you have any additional questions.

The National Archives has announced that the 1940 Census data will be made available free of charge via the Internet on April 2, 2012. While researchers can also access the material at NARA facilities across the country, Internet access will provide all members of the public with instant access to these historical Census records. Interestingly, the National Archives has also released training videos prepared for the 1940 Census takers which give researchers a unique perspective on the decade.

Eight times a year, the Federal Reserve publishes commentary on the current economic conditions throughout its regional districts and the nation as a whole. Their compilation, the Beige Book, is just one of the many publications produced by the Fed and made available on their web site. To assist researchers, FedinPrint is their comprehensive search engine which provides access to all of the Fed's reports, working papers, statistics and surveys.  It's an invaluable resource for any researcher tracking economic trends, following the financial crises throughout the world or monitoring the areas of securities law or banking.

Did you know that our neighbors on H Street produce policy reports for Congress on a daily basis? The U.S. Government Accountability Office bills itself as the "congressional watchdog" since they monitor and investigate how the federal government spends its budget. In this capacity, they produce indepth analysis of government programs and their reports can often serve as a wealth of background knowledge for seminar papers or other scholarly writing.

The newly released reports are highlighted on their home page and on their Facebook site. They are also searchable by keyword or report number. Some recent topics investigated by the GAO include:

• National Preparedness, Improvements Needed for Acquiring Medical Countermeasures to Threats from Terrorism and other Sources, GAO 12-121
• Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill: Actions Needed to Reduce Evolving but Uncertain Federal Financial Risks, GAO 12-86
• The Federal Government's Long-Term Fiscal Outlook, Fall 2011 Update, GAO 12-28SP

If you have any questions about how to access GAO reports or other sources for seminar paper topics, feel free to consult a reference librarian.

As the Supreme Court resumes work for another term, members of the Georgetown Law community can make use of our resources to monitor developments at the court.

• Supreme Court Today (BNA) tracks every Supreme Court petition and case on the docket, from filing to final disposition. The Supreme Court Today component of Law Week is a searchable database, with daily updates, allowing users to view the status of and search summaries of certiorari petitions filed since the 1995 October Term. The database also contains the full text of Supreme Court opinions, oral argument schedules, selected oral argument summaries, annual reviews of the Court's decisions, and more.
• Supreme Court Research Guide  This guide is designed to give some background information and suggest resources for further research on the history of the U.S. Supreme Court, the justices of the Court, and the Court's practice and decisions.

Should you have any additional questions, please feel free to ask a reference librarian.

The Congresssional Research Service has prepared a basic explanation of the Congressional budget cycle and the appropriations process with a graphical timetable of annual actions required to keep the federal government up and running. The interrelationship of the President's budget and the House and Senate Budget committees are explained.

Thanks to CALI and the Legal Information Institute, you can now get free eBook versions of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Criminal Procedure and Evidence. These rules books are released as part of CALI's eLangdell project, which is an innovative project seeking to change the way law school casebooks are published.  Texts are published in conjunction with Cornell's Legal Information Institute.

These books are available as ePub documents, which can be easily read on an iPad, iPhone, Nook, or any device that reads the ePub format.  See below for a view of all three texts on an iBooks shelf, as well as the table of contents view of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure on an iPad.

All three Federal Rules books include:

• Complete rules as of December 1, 2010.
• All notes of the Advisory Committee immediately following each rule.
• Table of Contents for easy navigation.
• Internal links cross-referenced rules.
• External links to the LII website's version of the US Code.

While these books are free to download, they were not free to produce.  If you like them, consider making a donation to the Legal Information Institute to show your support.