U.S. Federal Documents

U.S. Government Archival Resources

Guide to Government Publications Series

NARA (National Archives and Records Administration) http://www.nara.gov/ created in 1934 is an independent federal agency that helps preserve the nation's history by overseeing the management of all federal records. Nara establishes policies and procedures for managing U.S. government records and assists the federal agencies in documenting their activities, administering records management programs, scheduling records, and retiring non current records.
Nara is composed of the main agency in Washington D.C. with its branches in Maryland, the regional Nara record centers, the Center for Electronic Records, and the presidential libraries system. There are ten presidential libraries, two regional Nara record centers are located in California in San Bruno and Laguna Niguel.

Access to the records is provided through visits to the facilities, the Nara www pages, and acquisition of microfilm records, and copies of electronic documents. Nara provides various guides in print and in electronic format. Materials microfilmed by commercial publishers are listed in the publishers' catalogs.
Stanford Libraries purchases Nara microfilm and lists these in Socrates. Examples include the public papers of the presidents, the Department of State diplomatic records, and the decennial census schedules.

Selection of Guides:
Guide to federal records in the National archives of the United States, compiled by R.B. Matchette. 1995. 3 volumes.
Arranged by Record Group (RG) numbers with an index.
CD3026 1995 SSRC-reading room
http://www.nara.gov/guide/ Based on the 1995 edition with updates

Center for Electronic Records
http://www.nara.gov/nara/electronic/

Center for Electronic Records: Information about the Center's Holdings
http://www.nara.gov/nara/electronic/rshpage.html

National Archives College Park Maryland
http://www.nara.gov/nara/dc/Archives2_directions.html

National Archives Regional Records Services Facilities
http://www.nara.gov/regional/nrmenu.html

National Archives Regional NARA's Pacific Region (Laguna Niguel, CA)
http://www.nara.gov/regional/laguna.html

National Archives Regional NARA's Pacific Region (San Francisco) in San Bruno
http://www.nara.gov/regional/sanfranc.html

Nara Digitized Images Available on Internet
http://www.nara.gov/nara/pressrelease/nr98-03.html

Nara Federal Government Organizations: Including Presidential Materials; Congressional record groups;Executive agency record groups;Federal court record groups;
http://www.nara.gov/research/all/archives.html

Nara/Media Search
http://www.nara.gov/research/bymedia/bymedia.html

Nara Microfilm Search
Keyword, microfilm number, record group number
http://www.nara.gov/nara/searchmicro.html

Nara Research Room
http://www.nara.gov/research/

Nara Search Site
http://search.nara.gov/

Presidential Libraries and Locations
http://www.nara.gov/nara/president/address.html

Presidential Libraries Overview of the Presidential Libraries System
http://www.nara.gov/nara/president/overview.html