Library Guides: History: U.S. Government Documents

Federal Depository Collection

The Library of Lehigh University was designated a selective depository for U.S. government publications in 1876. It is the oldest depository in the state of Pennsylvania and the largest depository in the Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton Metropolitan Area.

Early materials in this collection were often simply cataloged as books and may be found while conducting a search of our online catalog ASA.

Notable materials held in the collection are Congressional Documents and Reports, the Congressional Record, Congressional Hearings, Census materials and beginning in the 20th century, materials published by executive departments such as Labor, Commerce, Transportation and State.

Since 1998 all Federal government publications have records in ASA, the Lehigh library online catalog.

ASA is a web capable catalog and any URLs (hotlinks to web sites) included in the records of electronic publications will take you to directly to the Internet versions of these materials.To search for government documents that do not appear in ASA it is necessary to search the Monthly Catalog of United States Government Publications. This catalog is available in printed form in the Government Documents Department Reference Stacks under the call number 015.73 U5m and dates back to 1936. Publications issued since 1976 can be located through these databases:

Catalog of U.S. Government Publications
the Catalog of U.S. Government Publications (CGP) is the finding tool for electronic and print publications from the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of the U.S. government. These publications make up the National Bibliography of U.S. Government Publications. The CGP contains descriptive records for historical and current publications and provides direct links to those that are available online.
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The catalog will grow to include records for publications dating back to the late 1800s, making the CGP the central point for locating new and historical Government publications.

U.S. Government Reports as Primary Sources

U.S. Congressional Serial Set This link opens in a new window
The U.S. Congressional Serial Set is an incomparably rich, and until this digitization, a largely untapped collection of primary source material detailing all aspects of American history. Lehigh's Federal Depository collection has had many of these materials in print form, however the indexing was limited and discovery was difficult and time consuming. With this online database one can easily research U.S. political, social, cultural, military and ethnic history, as well as international relations, exploration expeditions across the country and throughout the world, genealogy, commerce, industrial development and much more. Its contents come not only from the U.S. Congress, but also include key Executive Department publications and publication series. Lehigh's official subscription to this product contains the 19th and 20th Century documents beginning with Volume 1 in the first session of the 15th Congress (1817) and extending to 1980.

Congressional Record

The official records of House and Senate actions are kept in their respective journals, but a fuller record of proceedings is kept in the Congressional Record, which has been published by the Government Printing Office (GPO) since 1873. GPO publishes new issues of the record daily and transmits each new issue to the Library of Congress overnight. The Congressional Record is available online in a variety of places as indicated below:

HeinOnline This link opens in a new window
The Congressional Record is available in it's entirety in this database of legal history and documents in an online, fully-searchable, image-based format. This is a commercial database.

THOMAS (Library of Congress)
Coverage - 93rd Congress (1973) through the current Congress. Open access database

Lehigh's print holdings go back to 1873 as follows:

1873 - 1933 in Storage. The print indexes are in FM - 2- South in the Government Documents area under call number 328.732 C74r. Use the indexes to determine which volumes to request from storage.

Lehigh University Libraries - Library Guides

History

Federal Depository Collection

U.S. Government Reports as Primary Sources

Congressional Record