Getting Started
Please note that resources tagged with a blue lock symbol are available remotely only to UC San Diego affiliates.
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Catalog of U.S. Government PublicationsLists and describes federal publications (1976- ) and provides direct links to those that are available online. Search by authoring agency, title, subject, and general keyword. (See next tab for pre-1976 documents.)
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GoogleYou know you're going to use it, so use it efficiently: add site:.gov (site colon dot gov) to your keywords to limit searching to government websites. You can also limit searches to a specific department's or agency's website, such as site:dhs.gov (site colon dhs dot gov) to find only results from the Department of Homeland Security.
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govinfoPresents online versions of major U.S. government publications, such as: the Congressional Record, congressional publications of all kinds, the Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, Supreme Court decisions, executive branch documents and more. (Replaces the FDsys website.)
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GovSpeak: A Guide to U.S. Government Acronyms & AbbreviationsLists acronyms and abbreviations commonly used by the United States federal government. Each is defined and links to the home page (or best alternative) of the identified entity.
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Guide to U.S. Government Publications (Andriot)Traces depository publications through agency changes and assigned SuDoc numbers. Entries include title, publication history, ISSN, frequency of distribution, short descriptions, and notes about changes. Provides agency, title, and keyword in title indexes. The "Agency Class Chronology" traces the history of all agencies current or defunct. (Print only.)
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HeinOnlineOffers access to a vast number of publications from all three branches of the federal government. Search across collections from this main page, or click on a collection link to browse titles.
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MetaLibA federated search engine that searches multiple federal government databases, retrieving reports, articles, and citations while linking to selected resources available online.
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ProQuest CongressionalIndexes Congressional materials from 1789-present. Provides access to U.S. legislative information, including bills and pending legislation, legislative history, hearings, testimony, reports, documents, legislative calendars, committee rules of procedure, Congressional Record, CRS Reports, public laws, etc.
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Roger: the UCSD Library CatalogUse our catalog to find hard copy documents in our collection, as well as links to online documents. The advanced keyword search allows limiting to government publications.
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Statistical Abstract of the United States, ProQuest (2013- )Authoritative and comprehensive summary of statistics on the social, political, and economic conditions of the United States. This database replaces the previously-free Census Bureau publication (which are available online). It uses many of the same, along with additional, data sources as the earlier editions.
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United States Government Documents Registry (HathiTrust)The Registry is intended to include item-level metadata for the comprehensive corpus of U.S. federal documents produced from 1789 to the present.
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United States Government ManualThis official handbook of the federal government describes programs and activities of the legislative, judicial and executive branches. The Manual also includes information about quasi-official agencies, international organizations with U.S. membership, and federal boards, commissions, and committees.
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U.S. Congressional Serial SetReports, Documents, and Journals of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. (1817-1980)
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USA.govOfficial portal to government information and services provided by the federal government.
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WorldcatOver 50 million records of material cataloged by libraries. Often includes links to online full-text government publications.
Links go the UCSD Library catalog, which provides call number and location information for these print resources.
- 1774-1881 Descriptive Catalog of the Government Publications of the United States (Poore) (also online)
- 1789-1909 Checklist of United States Public Documents, 1789-1909 (also online)
- 1789-1970 Checklist of United States Public Documents, 1789-1970. Indexes.
- 1789-1976 Cumulative Title Index to United States Public Documents
- 1881-1893 Comprehensive Index to the Publications of the United States Government, 1881-1893 (Ames)
- 1885-1894 United States Government Publications (Hickcox) (online)
- 1893-1940 Catalog of the Public Documents of the Congress and of All Departments of the Government of the United States
- 1895-2004 Monthly Catalog of United States Publications (click "prior title" info to link to earlier volumes)
- 1900-1971 Cumulative Subject Index to the Monthly Catalog
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Congressional and Federal Government Web HarvestsSince 2006, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) has harvested Congressional web sites at the end of each Congress. They also did a wider harvest of federal websites for the 2004 Presidential transition.
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CyberCemeteryAn archive of government websites that have ceased operation (usually websites of defunct government agencies and commissions that have issued a final report).
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Digital Public Library of America (DPLA)Not specific to government publications, but offers access to digital content from a number of partners including the National Archives, HathiTrust, Internet Archive, Government Publishing Office, Library of Congress, and more.
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Digitization Projects RegistryDecommissioned 12/18. Contents archived at the FDLP Web Archive.
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DocumentCloudSearchable collection of primary source documents uploaded to DocumentCloud. Includes many government-related documents requested via FOIA.
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End of Term (EOT) Web ArchiveCaptures and saves U.S. government websites at the end of presidential administrations. EOT has thus far preserved websites from administration changes in 2008, 2012, and 2016.
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Federal Depository Library Program Web ArchiveTo provide permanent public access to federal agency web content, the FDLP harvests and preserves select federal websites.
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Fish & Wildlife Service National Digital LibraryAccess text documents, images, audio, video, and map files.
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FRASERDigital library of U.S. economic, financial, and banking history. Includes several titles that provide access to historical statistics.
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Google BooksIncludes government documents, as well as other items. To focus a search to government publications, try adding "Government Printing Office" or "G.P.O." in the publisher field.
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GovermentAttic.orgProvides electronic copies of thousands of federal government documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.
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HathiTrustThis large-scale digital repository is generally a first-stop resource when looking for older government documents. (See also the U.S. Federal Documents Collections page.)
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Internet Archive GovDocsCollection of federal government documents. See also the FedLink collection and the End of Term Web Crawls.
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Library of Congress Web ArchivingThe Library has been archiving select born-digital web content since 2000. Their collection includes, but is not limited to, federal government information.
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LLMC DigitalCollection of legal titles and government documents. Includes the Statutes at Large and US federal, US state, and foreign legislative, executive, and judicial materials.
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The Memory Hole 2Saves and preserves important documents that have been, or are at risk of being, deleted from government websites.
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National ArchivesAccess to a large and varied collection of documents. Not all items are available online. Search the library catalog for specific titles; results will include links to online material if available.
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National Agricultural LibraryAccess to a wide variety of historical Department of Agriculture publications.
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National Library of Medicine Digital CollectionsRepository of biomedical resources including books, still images, videos, and maps.
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National Transportation LibraryTransportation-related publications.
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National Security ArchiveNon-governmental archive of declassified U.S. documents. Founded by journalists and scholars to fight government secrecy.
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NOAA Digital CollectionsWeather and climate documents, publications from the Coast and Geodetic Survey, and Fisheries publications.
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TRAIL: Technical Report Archive and Image LibraryCollection of technical reports published by federal agencies.
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University of North Texas (UNT) LibrariesAccess to a large number of digitized documents, arranged in several distinct collections.
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Wayback MachineCaptures and preserves websites, including federal government websites. Search by URL.
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Demand ProgressWorks toward progressive policy changes, with emphasis on internet freedom, open government, and political finance reform.
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EDGI: Environmental Data & Governance InitiativeWorks to preserve data and web pages from EPA, DOE, NOAA, OSHA, NASA, USDA, DOI, and USGS. Monitors federal websites for changes made to environmental content.
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Government Web & Data ArchiveExtension of previous End of Term projects, which archived government websites and data. Project end date 9/1/19.
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Open the GovernmentA "nonpartisan coalition that works to strengthen our democracy and empower the public by advancing policies that create a more open, accountable, and responsive government."
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Project on Government OversightNonpartisan organization that "investigates and exposes waste, corruption, abuse of power, and when the government fails to serve the public or silences those who report wrongdoing."
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Sunlight FoundationWorks to make government more transparent and accountable.
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Wayback MachineEasy DIY web archiving. Use the "save page now" feature to archive a web page.
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Research Help
Kelly L. Smith
Contact:
UC San Diego Library
9500 Gilman Dr. 0175R
La Jolla, CA 92093-0175
858-534-6712
k5smith@ucsd.edu
pronouns: she, her, hers
9500 Gilman Dr. 0175R
La Jolla, CA 92093-0175
858-534-6712
k5smith@ucsd.edu
pronouns: she, her, hers
How to Cite Government Publications
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General Guidelines for Citing Government PublicationsProvides good background material on deciphering the various elements of a government publication for citation.
Open Access for Federally-Funded Research
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White House MemorandumFebruary 22, 2013 memo from the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), directing federal agencies to develop a plan to support increased public access to the results of research funded by the federal government.
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SPARC/JHU: Data Sharing Requirements by Federal AgencyResource for tracking, comparing, and understanding federally funded research data sharing policies.