This article was written by Daniel Schuman, the Sunlight Foundation's Policy Counsel.
Earlier this week I wrote about my curiosity regarding the differences between the House and Senate versions of the DISCLOSE Act, legislation that responds to the Supreme Court's campaign finance decision in Citizens United. Today, I have my answer.
Drawing upon THOMAS, Congress' online repository of its legislative information, I obtained XML versions of both documents and used Microsoft Word to compare the two. (For unknown reasons, although the House version has been available on THOMAS since last Friday, the Senate version only became available today.)
I have identified a handful of changes that go beyond style and organization:
The Senate version has findings relating to the rates that the media can charge for the purchase of advertisements, and rules implementing "lowest unit charge." (Sect. 401). Neither the findings nor rules exist in the House version.
• There are differences regarding the period of time during which the prohibitions on electioneering communications apply. (Sec. 202)
• The amounts of money triggering disclose of public independent disclosures are not the same. (Sec. 211)
• The Senate version requires Senate candidates to file their campaign reports with the FEC (Sec. 231). This is a rules change, and does not need to be in the House version.
There aren't a lot of changes, but I would have missed several of them in the 90-something page documents but for the legislation's online publication in a format that allows for easy comparison. Were they published only as PDFs, this task would have been much harder.
Still unexplained is why it took so long for THOMAS to make the Senate version of the DISCLOSE Act available in the first place.
Noah Kunin is the Multimedia Content Producer for the Sunlight Foundation. He leads the conceptualization and production of high-quality, creative and persuasive visual content that works in concert with articles and initiatives across the Sunlight Foundation's network. He also works with the latest technologies and open video community to connect government data to video content.
E-mail: nkunin@sunlightfoundation.comGOVERNING By the Numbers is a companion to GOVERNING Data that digests the growing body of work at the intersection of computer-assisted journalism, data visualization and government transparency.
GOVERNING By the Numbers is dedicated to telling important stories through numbers, with a focus on both our original work in data visualization on GOVERING Data and providing an ongoing tally of editor's picks of new and notable data releases of use to those in government and those who care about it.
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