A committee is a group of people who meet and deliberate according to fixed rules in order to make a decision or produce a document as a group. A commission is a group of people who are entrusted (that is the etymology) by a government to carry out a task. Sometimes the task is a specific one (like ascertaining a particular fact or resolving a particular problem) and sometimes the task is more long-term (like the SEC, that is, Securities and Exchange Commission). A commission is usually distinct from other kinds of agency in two ways: it has no single, permanent administrator, and it has no independent or constitutional authority of its own—it operates under the authority of another part of the government. Of course, a commission can be a committee (like the 9/11 Commission), but very few committees are commissions, and some commissions are not committees.
http://painintheenglish.com/case/3801
peer agreement (net): +3