The Historical Context for the Alabama Legislative Services Agency and Legislative Council has been posted from the Records Disposition Authority (RDA) approved by the State Records Commission on April 16, 2025. The RDA establishes disposition requirements by designating records as either temporary records which may be destroyed after a specified retention period, or permanent records, which must be preserved in perpetuity. The complete RDAs for close to 175 agencies can be found on the Alabama Department of Archives and History website.
Prior to the creation of the Legislative Services Agency (LSA), the divisions of LSA existed as three separate state agencies – Legislative Reference Service, Alabama Law Institute, and Legislative Fiscal Office. While the legislature passed minor legislative revisions often focused on personnel considerations, their core functions remain intact.
Governor Chauncey Sparks, in his 1945 legislative address, recommended the creation of “a reference bureau to furnish information, research, and experience in matters of legislation… removed from the Executive Department and not subject to its control in any way.”[1] Later that year, lawmakers established the Legislative Reference Service and the Legislative Council by Alabama Act 1945-152. Twelve legislators comprised the Legislative Council, which appointed the Legislative Reference Service Director and provided oversight of the agency, as it acts “as its research, reporting, and bill-drafting agency.” Outlined in Alabama Act 1945-152, Legislative Reference Service served to answer questions about governmental administration and organization, as well as constitutional and statutory law; to “make studies and reports on problems of state and local government in Alabama;” to assist legislators and other governmental officials with drafting legislation; to compile and codify state laws; and to perform any other tasks requested by the Legislative Council.[2] By the end of 1946, the newly created Legislative Reference Service had drafted around 200 bills under the leadership of the agency’s first director, Alex Pow.[3] The agency continued in this capacity until 1993, when the Legislative Reference Service Director received an additional designation as code commissioner, expanding the agency’s responsibilities to include determining “the content of the code and any supplements” and publishing the official Code of Alabama.[4]
In 1967, two decades after the creation of the Legislative Reference Service, Speaker of the House Hugh Merrill pushed to create a body that would examine needed statutory improvements and offer legal expertise and recommendations to the legislature.[5] Alabama Act 1967-249 enabled the Alabama State Bar’s board of commissioners to create and organize the Alabama Law Institute, to serve as the “official advisory law revision and law reform agency of the State of Alabama.” The legislation created a governing body for the Institute, consisting of attorneys, such as Alabama Supreme Court justice, the Attorney General, Alabama law school deans, and Legislative Council attorneys.
Located at the University of Alabama Law School, the Law Institute concentrated its research on broader issues of the law, while the Legislative Reference Service continued its focus on drafting legislation and performing research at the request of lawmakers. The Law Institute’s priorities were guided by the volunteer attorneys on its board. Act 1967-249 outlined the Law Institute’s purpose “to promote and encourage the clarification and simplification of Alabama’s laws to secure the better administration of justice and to carry on scholarly legal research and scientific legal work.” To achieve this mandate, legislators charged the Institute with researching state law and reporting its findings to the Legislature, including proposed legislation. However, the Legislature did not allocate state funding until the 1969 legislative session. At that time, Governor Albert Brewer praised the Institute’s potential to “serve a very vital function in keeping our laws clarified and simplified and can help us stay current in the legal field.”[6]
Not long after the creation of the Alabama Law Institute, the legislature pushed for the creation of an office that would provide independent and expert fiscal analysis. In January 1971, the Legislature passed a Joint Resolution to create the Joint Interim Fiscal Study Committee tasked with determining the need for a new agency to study “the effects of proposed revenue measures, State budget matters, bond issues and all other fiscal aspects of State government.”[7] Proponents of an independent fiscal office faced a filibuster led by Governor George Wallace supporters later in 1971 and a gubernatorial veto in 1973.[8] [9]
In 1975, fiscal office advocates succeeded in passing legislation. Act 1975-108 created the Legislative Fiscal Office to provide legislative budgetary committees and members of the Legislature with information about budgets, appropriation and taxation bills, and current and forecasted state revenue. The office’s creation gave legislators independent fiscal analysis instead of relying on information from the executive branch.[10] This Act also created the Joint Fiscal Committee, consisting primarily of House and Senate legislative budget committee members, to supervise the Legislative Fiscal Office and select the Office’s Director. In 1982, the Legislative Fiscal Office assumed the responsibility of analyzing “every general bill or resolution creating, eliminating or affecting in any way, a state or local program, service, function or revenue source and which thereby requires the expenditure of state, county, or municipal funds or thereby decreases or increases revenue collections by any county or municipality.”[11] This analysis, known as Fiscal Notes, estimates the financial impact of proposed legislation.
In 2015, Act 2015-408 moved the supervision of the Legislative Fiscal Office from the Joint Fiscal Committee to the Legislative Council and gave the Council appointment power over the Director of the Law Institute. The Legislative Council also took responsibility for the Legislative Building Authority, which gave the Authority the title to the State House and provided “for the management and supervision, administration, improvement, equipping, operation, and maintenance of such State House property.”[12] Under the act, the Senate Legislative Council also received the power to annually evaluate the job performance of the Secretary of the Senate, and the House Legislative Council the power to do the same for the Clerk of the House of Representatives.[13]
With the oversight responsibilities already shifted to the Legislative Council, Alabama Act 2017-214 brought the Legislative Reference Service, Alabama Law Institute, and Legislative Fiscal Office under the newly created Legislative Services Agency[14]. The Act conferred responsibility for appointing and evaluating the agency’s Director to the Legislative Council, with each of the former agencies constituting a division of LSA, headed by a deputy director.
The Legislature has passed other minor changes over the years. For example, Act 2023-224, among other things, expanded the Legislative Council’s control over the State House property by further defining the property boundaries of the State House and deeding the newly defined property to the Legislative Council, clarifying the authority of the Council to construct a new State House building.[15] Despite these changes to the state agencies created to assist Alabama lawmakers, the central goals of the Legislative Services Agency of providing professional and independent research, analysis, assistance, and advice has remained fundamental over the decades.
[1] “Message of Governor Chauncey Sparks,” General Laws (and Joint Resolutions) of the Legislature of Alabama, 1945.
[2] Alabama Act 1945-152.
[3] “Legislative Reference Service Bills Ready,” Montgomery Advertiser, November 5, 1946.
[4] Alabama Act 1993-618.
[5] James Bennett, “New Institute Would Study Legal Reform,” Birmingham Post-Herald, March, 20, 1969.
[6] Ibid.
[8] Don Wasson, “Is Redistricting Causing Slowdown?” Montgomery Advertiser, June 20, 1971.
[9] “Stewart wins, loses on vetoes,” Anniston Star, September 24, 1973.
[10] “Legislative independence is closer with new bill,” The Anniston Star, May 4, 1975.
[11] Alabama Act 1982-102.
[12] Legislative Building Authority was created by Act 2007-487.
[13] The Senate Legislative Council consists of the Senators on the Legislative Council, and the House Legislative Council consists of the Representatives on the Legislative Council.
[14] Alabama Act 2017-214 refers to the Law Institute as the “Law Revision Division,” but this Division is almost exclusively known as the Alabama Law Institute.
[15] Construction on a new State House began in late 2023.
Sources of Information
- Representatives of Legislative Services Agency
- Alabama Acts 1945-152, 1967-249, 1971-6, 1975-108, 1982-102, 1993-618, 2007-487, 2015-408, 2017-214, 2023-224
- Code of Alabama 1975 § 29-2-80 through § 29-2-202
- Code of Alabama 1975 § 29-4-40 through § 29-4-42
- Code of Alabama 1975 § 29-5A-1 through § 29-5A-64
- Code of Alabama 1975 § 29-6-1 through § 29-6-7.2
- Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-22-1 through § 41-22-27
- House Bill 147, 2013
- Constitution of Alabama of 1901, Amendment 803
- “Message of Governor Chauncey Sparks.” General Laws (and Joint Resolutions) of the Legislature of Alabama Passed at the Session of 1945. Birmingham: Birmingham Printing Company, 1945.
- Legislative Services Agency Website, https://alison.legislature.state.al.us/lsa
- Alabama Government Manual (2022)
- Bennett, James. “New Institute Would Study Legal Reform.” Birmingham Post-Herald. March 20, 1969.
- “Legislative independence is closer with new bill.” The Anniston Star. May 4, 1975.
- “Legislative Reference Service Bills Ready.” Montgomery Advertiser. November 5, 1946.
- “Stewart wins, loses on vetoes.” Anniston Star. September 24, 1973.
- Wasson, Don. “Is Redistricting Causing Slowdown?” Montgomery Advertiser. June 20, 1971.
For the Record 