Congress Investigates

For more than 200 years, Congress has conducted numerous high-level investigations that have riveted the nation, inspired landmark legislation, and transformed American history. The Byrd Center conducted a study of the history of Congress' investigations into domestic and foreign controversies over its history and in 2011 produced Congress Investigates: A Critical and Documentary History, a two-volume revised edition containing scholarly essays, key documents, chronologies, overviews, photographs, political cartoons, and other illustrations on the most significant congressional investigations over the past two centuries. Edited by Roger Bruns, David Hostetter, and Raymond Smock, Congress Investigates​ is available in both ebook and print formats from Facts on File, Inc., an Infobase Learning Company.
Table of Contents

​Volume 1

General St. Clair’s Defeat (1792)
The Burning of Washington (1814)
The Second Bank of the United States (1832)
The Assault on Charles Sumner (1856)
John Brown’s Raid on Harper’s Ferry (1859)
Conduct of the Civil War (1861-65)
The Joint Committee on Reconstruction (1865-67)
The Impeachment of Andrew Johnson (1867-68)
The Ku Klux Klan and Racial Violence (1871-72)
The Crédit Mobilier Scandal (1872-73)
The Clapp Committee and Campaign Finance Corruption (1912-13)
The Pujo Committee on the “Money Trust” (1912-13)
The Teapot Dome Scandal (1924)
The Pecora Committee and the Stock Market Crash (1933-34)
The Nye Committee on the Munitions Industry (1934-36)


​Volume 2

​The Dies Committee and The House Un-American Activities (1938)
The Truman Committee and War Mobilization (1941-44)
The Pearl Harbor Committee (1945-46)
The Kefauver Committee on Organized Crime (1950-51)
The Committee on the Firing of General MacArthur (1951)
The Army- McCarthy Hearings, (1954)
The Labor Racketeering Investigation (1957-61)
The Watergate Committee (1973-74)
The Church Committee on Intelligence (1975-76)
The Iran-Contra Hearings, 1987
The INSLAW Department of Justice Scandal (1989-91)
The Whitewater Investigation and the Impeachment of President Clinton (1992-98)
The 9/11 Commission (2002-05)
The Hurricane Katrina Inquiry (2005-06)