Number of California Bills by Code

I have often wondered about the number of bills in the California Legislature each year that affect the twenty-nine different codes. California’s 29 Codes, beginning with the Business & Professions Code and ending with the Welfare & Institutions Code, contain over 156,000 statutes. So, how many bills affect these 29 Codes each Session?

In the following chart, I look at the number of bills adding, amending, or repealing sections of California’s Codes each 2-year Session beginning with the 2015-16 Session and ending with the 2023 Session. The following chart contains those numbers:

Code	2023	2021 – 22	2019 – 20	2017 – 18	2015 – 16
Business & Professions	360	632	637	582	558
Civil	265	448	420	411	344
Civil Procedure	169	324	287	296	234
Commercial	10	22	23	27	27
Corporations	52	123	156	101	118
Education	370	588	618	630	575
Elections	83	125	149	164	144
Evidence	57	137	117	112	103
Family	103	195	172	165	155
Financial	35	105	101	85	76
Fish & Game	69	116	151	125	111
Food & Agricultural	75	152	137	139	140
Government	1,242	1,603	1,701	1,670	1,575
Harbors & Navigation	22	38	30	45	43
Health & Safety	694	1,082	1,083	959	889
Insurance	154	360	316	298	275
Labor	208	354	367	330	273
Military & Veterans	40	87	85	114	94
Penal	413	650	668	674	643
Probate	41	100	74	88	96
Public Contract	145	296	185	187	194
Public Resources	325	582	516	461	448
Public Utilities	174	309	351	307	324
Revenue & Taxation	227	448	449	496	430
Streets & Highways	74	127	139	139	157
Unemployment Insurance	61	174	139	124	84
Vehicle	163	300	320	359	318
Water	100	160	174	198	213
Welfare & Institutions	396	624	623	579	531

CMM 9/23/23

Most interesting to me is the relative consistency each Session with the number of bills affecting the same Code. In other words, during the last decade, roughly the same number of bills each Session affect an individual Code. For example, during the last four, 2-year sessions, the number of bills affecting the Revenue & Taxation Code have been: 448; 449; 496; and, 430.