The Federal Register

Before 1936 there was no single place to find federal regulations. The problem became an embarrassment in 1935, when the government prosecuted oil producers under a regulation that, it turned out, had been revoked, a fact revealed only when the case reached the Supreme Court. Congress responded with the Federal Register Act of 1935, and the first daily issue appeared on March 14, 1936. It is published every federal working day by the Office of the Federal Register, part of the National Archives, and printed by the Government Publishing Office.

Each issue contains four kinds of documents: final rules, proposed rules, notices from agencies such as meeting announcements and grant opportunities, and presidential documents, including executive orders and proclamations. Publication has legal effect: documents required to be published are not binding on the public until they appear, and publication gives everyone legal notice of their contents. A typical year fills 70,000 to 90,000 pages, a number often cited as a rough gauge of regulatory activity. It reached a record of about 106,000 pages in 2024, then fell to about 61,500 pages in 2025, the lowest since 1993, with 2,441 final rules, the fewest since record keeping began in the 1970s.

Final rules are later organized by subject into the Code of Federal Regulations, which arranges current regulations into 50 titles and is updated annually, with an electronic edition updated daily. FederalRegister.gov makes the Register searchable and links each rulemaking to the comment process on Regulations.gov.