Plain Writing legislative history:  

   Comparisons of Bill Versions
   Legislative History
   Media's Response: Blogs, etc.
   Historical Bibliography

Government use of plain language editing software:  

   stylewriterforgovernment

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The Plain Language Movement in Government
— A Concise Historical Bibliography
A Project of the Plain Writing Association

This ongoing Project of the Plain Writing Association presents links to articles that cover aspects of the history of the plain language movement within American government.

 History of federal government paperwork reduction efforts since America's founding:
Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "Paperwork Reduction Act Reauthorization and Government Information Management Issues," Congressional Research Service, Jan. 2007, by Harold C. Relyea.
History of federal government paperwork reduction efforts since 1942:
Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "Origins and Development of Federal Paperwork Policy" in Chapter 2, "Managing Information Collection and Dissemination," Office of Management and Budget, Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Fiscal Year 2002.
History of the Commission on Federal Paperwork:
Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "Red Tape and National Information Policy: The Commission on Federal Paperwork," by Andrea J. Winkler, The American University Law Review, Summer, 1977, Vol. 26, pp. 1208-1240.
History of plain language movement in U.S. government since WWII, especially 1990s and early 2000s:
Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "A History of Plain Language in the United States Government," 2004, Joanne Locke.
History of plain language movement in U.S. government since 1980s:
Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "Revisiting Plain Language," by Beth Mazur, May 2000, Vol. 47, No. 2, Technical Communication, The Journal of the Society for Technical Communication, reprinted in PlainLanguage.gov.
History of plain language legislation in U.S. government since 2007, including a summary of earlier history:
Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "Plain Writing Legislative History, 2007-2010," by Irwin Berent, Plain Writing Association, 2010.
Summary of major plain language studies of the 1970s to 1990s:
Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "Writing For Dollars, Writing To Please," by Joseph Kimble, from The Scribes Journal of Legal Writing, Vol. 6, 1996-1997.
History of National Performance Review/National Partnership for Reinventing Government:
Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "National Partnership for Reinventing Government (formerly the National Performance Review)," Jan. 1999, National Partnership for Reinventing America, GovInfo CyberCemetery, by John Kamensky.
History of NPR/PLAIN "No Gobbledygook" awards:
Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "Award-Winners," PlainLanguage.gov.

 Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star "Clinton administration awards last plain language prize," GovernmentExecutive.com, January 8, 2001, by Jason Peckenpaugh.

P.W.A. PROJECTS

Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star Plain Writing Legislation: A Comparison of Bills
      — This Project of the Plain Writing Association uses proofreading marks and side-by-side comparisons to show how the various versions of the major plain writing bills of the last few years evolved into the Plain Writing Act of 2010. (MORE)

Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star Plain Writing Legislative History
      — This Project of the Plain Writing Association presents a legislative history of the passage of the Plain Writing Act of 2010, documenting the process by which failed plain-writing legislation in the 110th and 111th Congresses ultimately led to the Act. (MORE)

Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star Government Use of Plain Language Editing Software
      — This Project of the Plain Writing Association is a separate website (theheroplace.com/writersupercenter/stylewriterforgovernment) which advocates the use of the ground-breaking plain-English editing software known as StyleWriter Software to assist government in writing more clearly and concisely, in compliance with the Plain Writing Act. (MORE)

Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star The Media's Response to Plain Writing Legislative Efforts
      — This ongoing Project of the Plain Writing Association attempts to document the media's response to the legislative efforts leading to the Plain Writing Act of 2010.  Focusing mainly on the period from 2007 to 2010, the Project, arranged chronologically, presents links to articles and posts in blogs, newspapers, and other periodicals. (MORE)

Plain Writing Association / Plain Writing Act / plain English star A Historical Bibliography of the Plain Language Movement
      — This ongoing Project of the Plain Writing Association presents links to articles that cover the main categories of the history of the plain language movement within American government. (MORE)

PLAIN ENGLISH SOFTWARE
StyleWriter For Government Website
Through our theheroplace.com/writersupercenter/stylewriterforgovernment website, PWA distributes plain-writing editing software to governments, businesses, organizations, and individuals. (MORE)

StyleWriter Editing Software
Working within MS Word, StyleWriter Editing Software converts any kinds of written documents (reports, correspondence, contracts, regulations, essays, etc.) into clear, concise, plain English... as you write. StyleWriter identifies and corrects more than 35,000 patterns of writing styles and problems. (See DEMO)

...StyleWriter Software is currently used in the offices of numerous federal agencies, such as the FDA, EPA, and FAA, as well as within 100s of businesses, organizations, and universities worldwide — and by 1000s of individuals.
      StyleWriter is helping to change the culture of careless, unclear, and confusing writing. And in the process, it is helping to save countless hours of work and millions of dollars otherwise lost answering confused client inquiries and complaints, clearing up foul-ups caused by miscommunications, and repeating misunderstood requests.

 Electronic Writing Course
We now have at our StyleWriterForGovernment website an Electronic Writing Course that can be used in conjunction with, or separate from, the StyleWriter Software. It's a thorough self-directed course in writing that provides employees with all they need to know to be proficient editors of their work and to make the most effective use of StyleWriter Software. (DETAILS)
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