DemocraSci – Where do we get the information on parliamentary bills from?
One of our main sources of parliamentary activities are the Übersicht der Verhandlungen --- the so-called summary documents. These documents were published for every parliamentary session and listed all the bills (all types!) that the parliament was currently dealing with.
1
Federal drafts
This is how federal drafts are reported in the summary documents (SD). Every bill has a title, the date it was submitted as a dispatch (Botschaft) to the parliament, and small text.
Committee assignments were based on ad-hoc committees until 1992. So for every bill, the committee names are also printed.
Last on the list are usually dates with important decisions (e.g., when a decision was made in either of the chambers).
2
Parliamentary Initiatives
This image is from later years, showing how the documentation style changed slightly over the years.
Parliamentary initiatives, for instance, also include a column with cosponsors (Mitunterzeichner).
Committee reports are documented below, similar to the list of important decisions above.
3
Motion, Postulate, Interpellation
So-called "personal bills" are reported in a similar style as federal dispatches or parliamentary initiatives.
The main distinction is that the text body of the bill is richer and more detailed, actually printing the submission text of the bills.
Most bills also contain a list of cosponsors (Mitunterzeichner).
For each bill we extract the following information:
Particularities of the Summary Documents
Bill mix
Early editions sometimes reported Motions and Postulates that pertained to certain federal dispatches right after the summary of the dispatch. In later years, these bills were also reported with the other postulates/motions.
Pardon Plea
Petitionen
Early editions of the Summary Documents still contained a list of petitions.
