News and Reports Sources

In addition to widely distributed newspapers and news magazinges (e.g. "The Dallas Morning News", "TIME", "Newsweek", etc.), you can find valuable information on the goings-on in Congress and with the presidency through specialized news sources listed here.

• CQ Weekly - This weekly news magazine reports on things going on with Congress and the administration. Online goes back to 1983. Older volumes located in Reference on the 2nd floor at JK 1 .C15.
• CQ Almanac / CQ Almanac Online - This resource provides detailed information on who-voted-for-what in the Senate and House, as well as a the make up of Congress in terms of political party affiliation. Located on the 2nd Floor of the Central Library in Reference at the call number JK1 .C66. Example of CQ Almanac information.
• CQ Researcher - This site provides comprehensive in-depth reports on a variety of political topics and legislation.
• Access World News - Use this database to search through major newspapers from around the world. Tips: Click on United States on the first screen to limit yourself to US papers. Then, change the "All Text" dropdown menu to "Lead/First Paragraph" to get more focused results.
• Historical New York Times - Unless your legislation happened in the late nineties or beyond, you may want to try the Historical New York Times. This link will let you search through the New York Times from 1851 - 2004.

Votes and Legislature Information

• THOMAS - This site from the Library of Congress is a searchable database of bills and legislation. For most searches, you will want to search through non-current congresses. Especially interesting reports can be found in the Congressional Record section, which provides transcripts of conversations in congress.
• LexisNexis Congressional - This extensive database provides access to Legislative Histories, bills, laws, and more.

Our government documents librarian is Tom Lindsey. If you need help interpreting what you find in these databases, contain either him or me, and we can help.

Polling Data

iPoll - The largest archives of public opinion polls with over 500,000 questions and answers asked in the U.S. since 1935.

• Try searching for a specific name. (e.g. "No Child Left Behind")
• Try limiting your dates to a time period of interest.
• When searching for broad subjects (like Education), use the SUBJECT drop-down to narrow your results.

Books and Analytical Journal Articles

• Library Catalog - Look here for books. While you may not find a whole book on your topic, it might be useful to find books about the presidency you are focusing on. There may be chapters or passages in those books that will be relevant to your topic.
• Worldwide Political Science Abstracts - Look here for analytical articles. The authors of these articles may not have the perspective or inside information that a congress member or congressional reporter might. However, these articles analyze the primary content you will be searching through.

Multidisciplinary Databases

The databases listed here are broader in scope. When you search in either one of these, your results might include newspaper articles, magazine articles, academic journal articles, book reviews, etc.

• Academic Search Complete - Multi-discipline, full-text database that covers: social sciences, humanities, education, computer sciences, engineering, language and linguistics, arts & literature, medical sciences, ethnic studies, etc.
• Article1st - Describes items listed on the table of contents page of individual issues of journals in all subject areas. Includes some abstracts.

Other Sources

• Executive Orders - Orders issued by the president. Full-text is available since 1993.
• Google - Do your search, but add site:*.gov to then end to limit your results to government websites.