The United States Code (U.S.C.), formally The Code of Laws of the United States of America, is the official codification of the general and permanent federal statutes of the United States. It organizes the statutory law of the United States into 53 titles, each covering a broad subject area, and numbers sections within those titles for reference.
Purpose and Scope
The Code provides a subject‑matter arrangement of statutes, consolidating provisions that were originally enacted as individual acts of Congress and published chronologically in the United States Statutes at Large. By eliminating repealed or expired provisions and grouping related material together, the Code simplifies legal research and reference.
Publication and Updating
The United States Code is prepared and published by the Office of the Law Revision Counsel of the U.S. House of Representatives. New editions are released every six years, with cumulative supplements issued annually to incorporate recent enactments and amendments. The official text of each law, as enacted, appears first in the Statutes at Large and is subsequently incorporated into the Code when the Law Revision Counsel determines that it should be codified.
Maintenance
The Law Revision Counsel (LRC) is responsible for deciding which statutes from the Statutes at Large are incorporated into the Code, for updating the Code to reflect subsequent amendments, repeals, and expirations, and for publishing the official version. The LRC also prepares annotations and cross‑references that help users locate related provisions and understand legislative history.
Relationship to Other Legal Materials
The Code is distinct from the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), which contains the rules and regulations issued by federal agencies under statutory authority. While the Code contains the statutes themselves, the CFR reflects the regulatory implementation of those statutes. Both are commonly cited in legal writing, with “U.S.C.” referring to the United States Code and “C.F.R.” to the Code of Federal Regulations.
Access
The United States Code is available in printed volumes and electronically through the official website of the Office of the Law Revision Counsel and other governmental portals. It is also reproduced by private legal publishers and is searchable via various online legal research services.
Historical Development
The codification effort began in the early 20th century to improve the accessibility of federal law. Prior to the Code, statutes were only available in the Statutes at Large, which arranged laws chronologically and made it difficult to locate provisions on a particular topic. The first official edition of the United States Code was published in 1926, and the system of titles and sections has been refined over subsequent decades.
Legal Status
Although the United States Code is a convenient reference, the text of the Statutes at Large remains the legal evidence of enacted law. In cases of discrepancy, the Statutes at Large prevails. Nevertheless, the Code is widely used by courts, practitioners, scholars, and the public for citation and research purposes.
