GovTrack Gem

An unofficial Ruby wrapper for the GovTrack API. You must agree to the surprisingly brief and readable license terms before using.

Installation

gem install govtrack

Then require 'govtrack' and you're good to go.

Usage

GovTrack data is supplied through various find methods:

sopa = GovTrack::Bill.find_by_id(71392) #Find SOPA with a GovTrack ID...
al = GovTrack::Person.find(firstname: 'Al', lastname: 'Franken') #...Al Franken with a hash of parameters...
john = GovTrack::Person.find_by_firstname_and_lastname('John','McCain') #...or John McCain with an ActiveRecord-style dynamic finder!

#Let's see if SOPA's sponsor is older than Al Franken.
sopa.sponsor.birthday < al.birthday
=> true

#Is he older than John McCain?
sopa.sponsor.birthday < john.birthday
=> false

Not all fields can be used in a query. Some fields support Django-style filters and some can span relationships. Refer to the GovTrack Data API Documentation for details.

Pagination

By default, the API returns data in arrays of 20. You can adjust this amount and move through the results by setting :limit and :offset in your query. Alternatively, call .find with a block to iterate through all of the results.

#Returns the titles of every bill currently introduced to the 112th Congress.
GovTrack::Bill.find(current_status: 'introduced', congress: 112) { |bill| bill.title }

Examples

See how Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich voted on 'H.R. 3590: Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act':

obamacare = GovTrack::Bill.find_by_congress_and_bill_type_and_number(111,:house_bill,3590)
recent_obamacare_vote = GovTrack::Vote.find(related_bill: obamacare, order_by: "-created").first

ron = GovTrack::Person.find_by_nickname_and_lastname('Ron','Paul')
ron_vote = GovTrack::VoteVoter.find(vote: recent_obamacare_vote, person: ron)
"#{ron.name_no_details} voted '#{ron_vote.option.to_display_text}' on '#{obamacare.title}'."
=> "Ronald Paul voted 'No' on 'H.R. 3590 (111th): Patient Protection and Afforble Care Act'."

dennis = GovTrack::Person.find_by_firstname_and_lastname('Dennis','Kucinich')
dennis_vote = GovTrack::VoteVoter.find(vote: recent_obamacare_vote, person: dennis)
"#{dennis.name_no_details} voted '#{dennis_vote.option.to_display_text}' on '#{obamacare.title}'."
=> "Dennis Kucinich voted 'Aye' on 'H.R. 3590 (111th): Patient Protection and Affordble Care Act'."

List the female members of congress who abstained from voting on 'H.R. 3: No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act':

hr3 = GovTrack::Bill.find_by_congress_and_bill_type_and_number(112,:house_bill,3)
recent_hr3_vote = GovTrack::Vote.find(related_bill: hr3, order_by: "-created").first
GovTrack::VoteVoter.find(vote: recent_hr3_vote) { |vote_voter|
  vote_voter.person.name if vote_voter.option == '0' && vote_voter.person.gender == 'female'
}
=> "Rep. Gabrielle Giffords [D-AZ8, 2007-2012]"
=> "Rep. Jo Ann Emerson [R-MO8]"

Tips

If you're searching for a particular bill by its number, include a congress and bill_type in your query as well.
There will often be more than one vote related to a bill.
Depending on your application, consider using GovTrack's Bulk Raw Data instead.

govtrack

Development