LibGuides: Research by Type: Government Documents

Government Documents

ArchiveGrid This link opens in a new window
Access to primary source information, including locating birth and death records, ship logs, and cemetery records.
Congress.gov This link opens in a new window
The official website for U.S. federal legislative information. The site provides access to accurate, timely, and complete legislative information for Members of Congress, legislative agencies, and the public. It is presented by the Library of Congress (LOC) using data from the Office of the Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives, the Office of the Secretary of the Senate, the Government Publishing Office, Congressional Budget Office, and the LOC's Congressional Research Service.
U.S. Congressional Serial Set This link opens in a new window
The American State Papers and the U.S. Congressional Serial Set are the official historical record of the U.S. government as it weathered each event in American history. The documents within record the words and actions of key players in the political life of the United States, and thus reflect the mindset of each era from 1789.
DigitalNC This link opens in a new window
Historical materials from cultural heritage repositories across North Carolina. Provided by NC LIVE.
Digital Sanborn Maps (1867-1970) for North Carolina This link opens in a new window
Historical maps, detailed property and land-use records in 158 North Carolina towns and cities. Provided by NC LIVE.
GPO Access This link opens in a new window
A service of the U.S. Government Printing Office that provides free electronic access to a wealth of important information products produced by the Federal Government. The information provided on this site is the official, published version and the information retrieved from GPO Access can be used without restriction, unless specifically noted.

Includes: legislative, executive, and judicial content, curated collections, digitized historical content, and high-profile publications.
HeritageQuest This link opens in a new window
Genealogy research database. Includes historical census, PERSI, Revolutionary War records, and more. Provided by NC LIVE.
MetaLib This link opens in a new window
MetaLib is a federated search engine that searches multiple U.S. Federal government databases, retrieving reports, articles, and citations while providing direct links to selected resources available online.
NCJRS Virtual Library This link opens in a new window
Searches the NCJRS web site and the web sites of the agencies of the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, and the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, and the NCJRS collection of 7,000+ full-text publications.
North Carolina General Statues This link opens in a new window
This is the public repository for all NC General Statues, including education law.

Usage Notes: This Tutorial Video provides information about searching the General Statues for Education topics. If you have questions, please contact the library (ref.desk@uncp.edu).
Historical Statistics of the United States This link opens in a new window
This definitive reference work contains more than 37,000 annual time series of quantitative historical information covering virtually every quantifiable dimension of American history: population, work and welfare, economic structure and performance, governance, and international relations, all from the earliest times to the present. Each series is fully documented and placed in historical context by a recognized expert.
State Data Center This link opens in a new window
The site includes population, economic, and income data as well as county profiles and rankings. Provided by NC LIVE.
Statistical Abstract of the United States This link opens in a new window
Statistics about the social, political, and economic organization of the United States. Provided by NC LIVE.
World Constitutions Illustrated This link opens in a new window
This library enables legal scholars to research the constitutional and political development of every country in the world. It includes the current constitution for every country, constitutional histories, periodicals, classic books, and many more!

Engineering Database This link opens in a new window
This database provides discipline-specific coverage of engineering, spanning thousands of publications, many in full text. Provided by NC LIVE.
ChemSpider This link opens in a new window
ChemSpider is a free chemical structure database providing fast text and structure search access to over 100 million structures from hundreds of data sources.
PubChem This link opens in a new window
PubChem is the world's largest collection of freely accessible chemical information. Search chemicals by name, molecular formula, structure, and other identifiers. Find chemical and physical properties, biological activities, safety and toxicity information, patents, literature citations and more.
SciFinder-n This link opens in a new window
SciFinder-n is an updated version of SciFinder, the research discovery tool that allows college students and faculty to access a wide diversity of research from many scientific disciplines, including biomedical sciences, chemistry, engineering, materials science, agricultural science, and more. Updates include an improved interface, more relevant results, procedure summaries, patent chemistry, and citations to literature.

User Note: Please click here to CREATE AN ACCOUNT

If you are experiencing access issues, please submit a Report an Access Issue form

ERIC This link opens in a new window
An authoritative database of indexed and full-text education literature and resources sponsored by the Institute of Education Sciences of the U.S. Department of Education. Includes journal articles, books, conference papers, curriculum guides, dissertations and policy papers.
HeinOnline This link opens in a new window
Includes multidisciplinary periodicals, essential government documents, international resources, case law, and much more. In addition to its vast collection of law journals, HeinOnline contains the entire Congressional Record, Federal Register, and Code of Federal Regulations, complete coverage of the U.S. Reports back to 1754, and entire databases dedicated to treaties, constitutions, case law, world trials, classic treatises, international trade, foreign relations, U.S. Presidents, and much more.
Legal Information Institute This link opens in a new window
An non-profit sources of U.S. and International Legal documents for research purposes. Includes Supreme Court Decisions, State Regulations, Executive Orders, Treaty, and More.
Nexis Uni This link opens in a new window
Includes articles from local, regional, national and international newspapers, magazines, online journals, television and radio broadcasts, newswires and blogs, transcripts, and legal research, as well as federal and state cases and statutes, including U.S. Supreme Court decisions since 1790.

Bibliography of Indigenous Peoples in North America This link opens in a new window
Citations for books, essays, journal articles and government documents of the United States and Canada, pertaining to native North Americans, including culture, history and daily life. This resource is ideal for researching the contributions, struggles and issues surrounding North America's Indigenous peoples.

Subjects: Archaeology, Gaming, Governance, Legend, Literacy, Multicultural relations
HeinOnline This link opens in a new window
Includes multidisciplinary periodicals, essential government documents, international resources, case law, and much more. In addition to its vast collection of law journals, HeinOnline contains the entire Congressional Record, Federal Register, and Code of Federal Regulations, complete coverage of the U.S. Reports back to 1754, and entire databases dedicated to treaties, constitutions, case law, world trials, classic treatises, international trade, foreign relations, U.S. Presidents, and much more.
Indigenous Peoples of the Americas: History, Culture & Law This link opens in a new window
Includes an expansive archive of historical materials, primary sources, and government documents, consolidates the wealth of material available on indigenous American life and law, and shares the tremendous influence that indigenous peoples and their cultures have had on the development of the United States.
Includes: Indigenous treaties; Treaty-related publications; Federal case law; Tribal codes; Constitutions; Jurisprudence; Scholarly articles; Title 25 of the U.S. Code; Title 25 of the CFR; Books and pamphlets; Bibliography; External resources

Archives Preserving Federal Government Websites

End of Term Archive

The End of Term Web Archive captures and saves U.S. Government websites at the end of presidential administrations. The EOT has thus far preserved websites from administration changes in 2008, 2012, 2016, and 2020.

The Internet Archive

Internet Archive is a non-profit library of millions of free texts, movies, software, music, websites, and more.

Wayback Machine

The Wayback Machine provides access to websites that have been archived by the Internet Archive. Plug in the URL of a website to see if it has been archived.

Joseph R. Biden Jr. Presidential Library

In January 2025, the White House website was archived as a way to preserve the online presence of the administration of President Joseph R. Biden Jr. The official files that make up a Presidential administration's website are preserved in the National Archives’ Executive Office of the President Electronic Records Archive. In order for the public to easily access the websites, the National Archives has taken an additional step to "freeze" the websites and make them available online. Because the archived websites are hosted by the National Archives and are historical material, they are no longer updated. Any broken links (internal or external) will not be updated.

Source Cooperative - Data.gov Mirror

A project of the Harvard Law School Library Innovation Lab, this is a regularly updated mirror of Data.gov, the US federal government data finding and storage site.

Archives with Openly Available Data

Finding Alternative Sources for Federal Information & Data

Links to sources listed by subject compiled by UNC Chapel Hill.

Alternative Sources for Federal Government Data

Census Reporter

Census Reporter is an independent project to make data from the American Community Survey (ACS) easier to use. We are unaffiliated with the U.S. Census Bureau.

Data Rescue Efforts (Google Doc)

These suggestions come from various sources, including IASSIST, RDAP, Data Curation Network, BlueSky, LinkedIn, and others. A librarian at a university is compiling it. I am keeping the document unshared for the moment, but I can add suggestions. Feel free to email iassistdata@gmail.com if you have suggestions.

FRED

Created and maintained by the Research Department at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, FRED is an online database consisting of hundreds of thousands of economic data time series from scores of national, international, public, and private sources. Browse by 14 different categories.

ICPSR

While much data at ICPSR is only available to member institutions (which UNC is), federal datasets are available to anyone.