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Government Information

A guide to help users find U.S. government documents and information.

Welcome to the Government Documents and Information Research Guide!

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This guide will point you to library resources that will help you in your research of U.S. Government documents and information. Use the tabs on the left to narrow your search to specific areas.

The United States Government is the largest publisher in the world. It distributes materials in a variety of formats, including electronic, CD, microfiche, and paper. As part of it's publishing program, the U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO), through the Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP), distributes certain classes of Government documents free of cost to designated libraries throughout the United States and its territories. These libraries are known as Federal depository libraries. Federal depository libraries must offer free, public access to their Federal collections, even if the depository library is a part of a private academic institution. WKU Libraries has been a Federal depository library since 1934.

MAIN ONLINE RESOURCES

WKU Libraries offers a one-stop search to find research materials such as books, journal articles, and digital objects. This search ives users results across nearly all library collections with a relevant-ranked list similar to a Google search. One-Search also helps you manage your research. Sign-in to: 

My Account - Renew items, view items on loan, due dates, fines, requests or blocks.

Sign-in and use the pins to create a favorites list or set up email alerts or a RSS feed based on search results.

Off campus users must click on the Off Campus Login before following internet links.

Export citations to Refworks and Endnote Web from your favorites as a list or individually while signed in.

View full search results or request items from search results. (Some databases only show results when you're signed in)

HeinOnline is an online database containing more than 186 million pages and 287,000 titles of historical and government documents in a fully searchable, image-based format. In addition to its vast collection of academic 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.

 

Govinfo is free U.S. government information for all. It is a service of the United States Government Publishing Office (GPO), which is a Federal agency in the legislative branch. Govinfo provides free public access to official publications from all three branches of the Federal Government.

The CGP is the finding tool for federal publications that includes descriptive information for historical and current publications as well as direct links to the full document, when available. Users can search by authoring agency, title, subject, and general keywords, or click on "Advanced Search" for more options.