A Study of Characteristics and Types of Congressional Records

의회기록의 특질과 종류

This paper treated what are congressional records which are one of core fields of national records and what kind of significant records they have. The characteristics of "substantive records" of the institution among public records are as follows: firstly, their contents depend on the inherent function of the institution; secondly, their types differ by the character of basic unit(member); thirdly, their sources are determined by the character of institution. Starting from the above points of view, the contents, characteristics, main sources, and types by sources of congressional records were presented. They are summarized as follows. In Chapter 2, the substantial records, which document the intrinsic function of congress on the basis of analyses of inherent function and structural uniqueness of congress have natures of which the contents are "legislative records", "oversight records", and "political activity records" starting from the inherency of congress as the people's representation. The typical natures of congress records are related with the specialty that the basic unit of congress structure is an individual congressman as an indepent national institution and congress is a council of these congressmen. Firstly, the records of congressmen as basic member of congress are the national records with the type of personal records. Secondly, "council records" produced by the council (commettee and main conference), which have evidencial and informative value for decision making through the process of investigating, discussing and voting bill and policy (item) of the basis for national management, are very special kind of records, such as item records, decision records, journal records, and congress assistant records. Because congressmen and councils composing congress have an equal inter-relationship in the structure of congress, the main sources of congress records are an individual congressman and all the councils. In chapter 3, the contents and sorts of main records are discribed, centering around congressmen and councils as the main sources of congress records. In chapter 4, the management of records of congressmen is issued as an urgent subject for the management of congress records, instead of conclusions.