Statutes at Large is "the permanent collection of all laws and resolutions enacted during each session of Congress .... Every public and private law passed by Congress is published in the Statutes at Large in order of the date it was enacted into law. The laws are arranged by Public Law number and are cited by volume and page number. Also included in the United States Statutes at Large are concurrent resolutions, proclamations by the President, proposed and ratified amendments to the Constitution, and reorganization plans. Until 1948, treaties and international agreements approved by the Senate were also published in the Statutes at Large" (from the About Statutes at Large).
Each new volume of Statutes at Large is published two or more years after the close of the related Congressional session.
Statutes at Large is available:
A. In print or on microfilm, at some large law libraries;
B. Free online from the 1st through the 43rd Congress (1789-1875) from the from the Library of Congress.
C. Free online from the 108th Congress (2003-04) to the present from the FDsys;
D. On Lexis (LEGIS;STATLG) from Volume 1 to the present. If you have a citation, you can pull a law or other document using the format: "99 Stat 1761". To retrieve only Private Laws, add "and HEADING(Private Laws)" to the end of your search string;
E. Back to volume 1 (1789) for subscribers to Hein Online;
F. Back to volume 1 (1789) for subscribers to ProQuest Congressional, if they have also purchased the U.S. Statutes at Large add-on subscription; and
F. For sale in print from the U.S. Government Online Bookstore, from William S. Hein & Co. and, used, from The Law Book Exchange.
Annotations: If a Federal law has been codified into the United States Code, you can find annotations for each Code section in the United States Code Annotated and the United States Code Service (see "United States Code"). If a Federal law has not been codified, you can find judicial opinions, law review articles and other sources citing the law by looking up the Statutes at Law citation in the print edition of Shepard's Federal Statute Citations.