PA Title 18 – Crimes and Offenses (PDF)
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How to Read a Bill

Pennsylvania House and Senate bills look intimidating at first, but once you know the printing conventions, they're easy to follow. Every bill uses the same set of markings to show what's being added, removed, or left alone.

[Light brackets] appear only in bills that amend existing law. Anything inside them is current law that the bill proposes to delete. If the bill passes, the brackets stay in the published version so readers can see exactly when that language was removed. Bracketed text is also shaded to make it stand out.

Underlining also appears only in bills amending existing law. Underlined text is new language that isn't in current law but would be added if the bill passes.

Ellipses ( * ) mark sections of existing law that the bill skips over and leaves unchanged.

[Dark brackets] show up only in bills that have already been amended in committee or on the floor. They mark deletions added by that amendment and work the same way as light brackets.

Strikeout text appears only in amended bills. It marks language that was in an earlier print of the bill but has been cut and will not become law. Strikeout is also used to remove wording from a brand-new bill that hasn't become law yet.

CAPITAL LETTERS appear only in amended bills. They mark language that wasn't in the original print but was inserted by amendment in either chamber. If the bill passes, this text becomes law in normal type — unless it's also underlined, in which case it's printed in italics.

Strikeout and capitals only show the most recent round of amendments. Each new print drops earlier strikeouts and resets earlier capitalized insertions to normal type. The one exception: when a bill is amended more than once in the opposite chamber, later prints keep all of that chamber's amendments visible, so the originating chamber can see everything it needs to concur on.