Background

With legislation largely done by professional staff and politicians working behind closed doors, it is no wonder that rates of trust in Congress are at historic lows. Lobbyists vying for precious face time with Members and constituents’ emails and letters piling up are fueling the demand from lawmakers and the public alike for innovative and efficient ways to tap into the public’s expertise and know-how. Crowdlaw is what GovLab calls the use of the Internet to enable people to participate in one or more stages of the lawmaking process, including but not limited to problem identification, solution identification, proposal drafting, ratification, implementation or evaluation.

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