Private laws generally benefit a particular person or group of individuals.
Public laws are of general application.
This research guide focuses on how to research federal public laws. The public law number is the unique identification number for each law. Public laws are numbered sequentially starting with each new Congress. The second number is a sequential number assigned to the law by the General Services Administration. Since 1974, citations to the United States Code have been included in the text of the law and indicate where the statute appears in the Code.