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	<Title PrependSiteTitle="1">Tweeting About Congress</Title>

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		<h1 class="PageTitle">Tweeting About Congress</h1>
		
		<p><a href="http://www.twitter.com">Twitter</a> is a great platform
		for mobilizing around bills in Congress, and it gives us an
		opportunity to see what people are saying around the web.
		We're tracking the conversations around legislation. You can
		find the tweets of congressmen over at <a href="http://tweetcongress.org/">TweetCongress</a>
		or <a href="http://legistalker.org/">Legistalker</a>.</p>
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			<h3 style="margin-top: 0px">Use These Hashtags</h3>
			
			<p>Hashtags are little words or mnemonics starting with a 
			#-sign that people use to tie their tweets to a larger topic. 
			GovTrack recommends the hashtag
			<span style="font-family: monospace; font-weight: bold"><a href="http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23usbill">#usbill</a></span>
			when discussing legislation in the U.S. Congress.</p>
			
			<p>Combine <span style="font-family: monospace; font-weight: bold"><a href="http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23usbill">#usbill</a></span>
			with a hashtag for a particular bill, like
			<span style="font-family: monospace; font-weight: bold"><a href="http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23hr2737">#hr2737</a></span>
			if you're talking about <a href="congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-2737">H.R. 2737: Child Protection Compact Act</a>.</p>

			<p>You don't have to worry about the details. Just
			<a href="congress/legislation.xpd">find the bill</a>
			on GovTrack and grab the hashtags we list in the blue
			box in the sidebar.</p>
			
			<p>Also check out <a href="http://tinythom.as">tinythom.as</a> for short URLs to legislative pages.</p>
			
			<h3>Forming Bill Hashtags</h3>
			
			<p>There are six types of bills in Congress. Each has a different
			abbreviation. Use these abbreviations in your hashtags:</p>
			<ul>
			<li><tt>hr###</tt> for "H.R." House bills,</li>
			<li><tt>hres###</tt> for "H.Res." House simple resolutions,</li>
			<li><tt>hjres###</tt> for "H.J.Res." House joint resolutions,</li>
			<li><tt>hconres###</tt> for "H.Con.Res." House concurrent resolutions,</li>
			<li><tt>s###</tt> for "S." Senate bills,</li>
			<li><tt>sres###</tt> for "S.Res." Senate simple resolutions,</li>
			<li><tt>sjres###</tt> for "S.J.Res." Senate joint resolutions, and</li>
			<li><tt>sconres###</tt> for "S.Con.Res." Senate concurrent resolutions.</li>
			</ul>

			<p>But again you don't have to worry about this. Just find the bill
			on GovTrack and grab the hashtags we list.</p>
			
			<h3>Bills In Past Years</h3>
			
			<p>Congress works in two-year sessions and the numbering of
			bills and resolutions restarts every two years. That means there
			actually have been more than one hundred "H.R. 1" bills going
			back to the start of the nation. Let's assume that if you're
			refering to a current bill, you don't need to be more specific
			than the simple hashtag described above.</p>
			
			<p>If you're referring back to legislation from a previous
			session of Congress, tack on a forward slash and then the
			Congress number. Here's an example:
			<span style="font-family: monospace; font-weight: bold"><a href="http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23hr1/105">#hr1/105</a></span>
			for <a href="congress/bill.xpd?bill=h105-1">H.R. 1: Working Families Flexibility Act of 1997</a>.</p>
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			<p style="margin-top: 0px; text-align: center; font-size: 120%; font-weight: bold">incoming <a style="font-family: monospace" href="http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23usbill">#usbill</a> tweets</p>

			<script language="javascript">
			var jtw_search = "#usbill";
			var jtw_width = "auto";
			var jtw_height  = "50em";
			var jtw_widget_border = '0px';
			var jtw_tweet_background = '#FAFAEE';
			var jtw_tweet_border = '1px dashed #999';
			var jtw_pre_html = ' ';
			var jtw_widget_style_misc = 'font-family: verdana, arial, sans;';
			</script>
			<script src="http://tweetgrid.com/widget/widget.js" type="text/javascript"></script>
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