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New York State Legislative History Research: Brennan Center Reports

This guide is intended to help researchers locate print and online sources for New York State Legislative History Research.

Brennan Center for Justice Reports

In 2004, Brennan Center for Justice issued a stinging report describing New York's legislative process as "broken." 

This report identified five key problems:

  • Dysfunctional legislative committees (p. 1)
  • Barriers to consideration of legislation by the full Senate or Assembly (p. 3)
  • No debate, no amendments, inadequate review (p. 4)
  • Few conference committees (p. 6)
  • Legislative inefficiency and high costs (p. 7)

There also were two updates to the original report.  See:

For a report on key recent changes to New York's criminal justice policy, see: