canonical: https://jentic.com/apis/data.gov/regulations-gov # Data Gov Regulations.gov API Jentic publishes the only available OpenAPI specification for Regulations.gov, keeping it validated and agent-ready. Regulations.gov is the United States federal portal for proposed and final rulemaking, public comment dockets, and supporting documents across federal agencies. The API exposes three endpoints for fetching docket information, fetching individual document records, and searching documents. Authentication uses a Data.gov api_key passed as a query parameter against the https://api.data.gov/regulations/v3 base URL. ## For AI agents Search and retrieve United States federal rulemaking dockets and documents from the Regulations.gov public record. ## Scope Does not handle US legislative bills, executive orders, or international regulatory bodies - use for United States federal rulemaking dockets and documents from Regulations.gov only. ## Capabilities - Search Regulations.gov documents by agency, docket, and date filters - Retrieve a specific docket record by docket identifier - Retrieve a specific document record by document identifier - Switch response format between JSON and XML using the response_format path parameter - Authenticate calls with a Data.gov api_key issued for free at https://api.data.gov ## Use cases ### Regulatory Monitoring for Compliance Teams Monitor proposed federal rules and dockets relevant to a regulated business. The GET /documents.{response_format} endpoint searches the corpus by agency and date, and GET /docket.{response_format} returns the specific docket for context. Suitable for compliance, legal, and policy teams that must track rulemaking across multiple federal agencies. Example prompt: Search documents from agency 'EPA' posted in the last 7 days, then fetch each parent docket via GET /docket.json for context. ### Public Comment Research Research the public comment record on a specific federal rule by retrieving the docket and its associated documents. GET /document.{response_format} returns the full text and metadata for each document, useful for journalists, researchers, and advocacy groups analysing comment periods. The corpus covers active and archived dockets. Example prompt: Retrieve a specific document via GET /document.json with the document ID and return its title, agency, and posted date. ### Civic Tech Dashboards Build civic dashboards that aggregate active dockets, comment counts, and recent documents for a public audience. The three endpoints together cover discovery, docket detail, and document detail with both JSON and XML response formats. Useful for civic-tech projects, transparency newsrooms, and academic policy trackers. Example prompt: Search documents across all agencies posted today, group results by agency code, and produce a dashboard summary of active rulemakings. ### Agent-Driven Policy Briefs via Jentic AI agents that produce regulatory briefs or rulemaking summaries can call Regulations.gov through Jentic without holding the api_key. The agent searches Jentic for the relevant intent, loads the schema, and executes the search or document retrieval with the key held in your Jentic One instance. This keeps the Data.gov key isolated from the agent's prompt context. Example prompt: Use Jentic to search 'search regulations.gov documents', load GET /documents.json, and execute it with the user's agency and topic filters to produce a brief. ## Key endpoints | Method | Path | Description | | --- | --- | --- | | GET | /docket.{response_format} | Get a docket record by docket identifier | | GET | /document.{response_format} | Get a document record by document identifier | | GET | /documents.{response_format} | Search documents by agency, docket, and date filters | ## Key resources - **Dockets** — Retrieve federal rulemaking dockets by ID - **Documents** — Search and retrieve individual rulemaking documents ## Why Jentic - **Setup:** Wiring Regulations.gov by hand means learning its api_key query auth against api.data.gov/regulations/v3 and building the paging and retry plumbing for dockets and documents yourself. Through Jentic you install once, import the Regulations.gov API from the API Directory, store the key once, and your agent calls it. - **Permission scoping:** Regulations.gov selects dockets and documents through request parameters rather than a resource id in the path, so limit the agent to the operations it needs, such as listing documents or fetching a single docket. This API is read-only here, so the agent can only fetch what you allow it to fetch. - **Credential handling:** Your Regulations.gov api_key is stored once, encrypted, by your own Jentic One instance and appended as the api_key query parameter at execution time. It never enters the agent's prompt, logs, or context. - **Discovery method:** Agents search Jentic by intent such as 'search Regulations.gov documents' or 'fetch a rulemaking docket', and Jentic returns the matching operation with its input schema so the agent calls the right endpoint without parsing the legacy data.gov reference docs. ## Related APIs - **Congress.gov API** — Congress.gov covers legislative bills and members; Regulations.gov covers executive-branch rulemaking. - **EBI Public Data APIs** — EBI exposes public scientific datasets; Regulations.gov exposes US rulemaking - both serve research workflows. - **OpenAlex API** — OpenAlex indexes scholarly publications; Regulations.gov indexes federal rulemaking documents. ## FAQ ### Why is there no official OpenAPI spec for Regulations.gov? Regulations.gov does not publish a formal OpenAPI specification. Jentic generates and maintains this spec so that AI agents and developers can call Regulations.gov via structured tooling. It is validated against the live API and kept up to date. Get started with Jentic One, the self-hosted execution layer. ### What authentication does the Regulations.gov API use? The Regulations.gov API uses a Data.gov api_key passed as a query parameter on every request. The key is free to obtain from api.data.gov. Through Jentic the api_key is stored in the vault and appended to outbound requests so it never enters the agent's context. ### Can I search documents by agency with the Regulations.gov API? Yes. GET /documents.{response_format} accepts agency, docket, and date filters and returns matching documents in JSON or XML based on the response_format path parameter. ### What are the rate limits for the Regulations.gov API? Limits are governed by Data.gov's signed-up api_key tier - typically 1,000 requests per hour by default. Apply backoff on 429 responses and request a higher-tier key from api.data.gov for production workloads. ### How do I retrieve a docket through Jentic? Run pip install jentic, then search Jentic for 'get a regulations.gov docket', load the GET /docket.{response_format} schema, and execute it with the docket identifier and response_format set to 'json'. ### Does the Regulations.gov API return JSON or XML? Both. The response_format path parameter accepts 'json' or 'xml' and the response is shaped accordingly - pick JSON for most agent and Jentic-driven workflows. ### Can I limit what my agent is allowed to do with the Regulations.gov API? Yes. Because Jentic One is self-hosted, your own rules decide which Regulations.gov operations and credentials the agent may use. This API is read-only, so you can restrict the agent to just the operations it needs, such as searching documents with GET /documents, fetching a single docket with GET /docket, or fetching one document with GET /document, and withhold the rest. Your Data.gov api_key stays in your instance and is appended at execution time, so the agent can only read the records you have allowed.