How to find a government document if you know its title.
If you know the exact item you need (e.g. Hearing before the United States Commission on Civil Rights : police practices and civil rights), use a known item search strategy. Step one in this case is to find the document via an online catalog, then retrieve the item depending on whether it is physical or electronic, and where it is located.
- LINK+ catalog: As a Wardman Library user, you have the option to see if an associated LINK+ library has a document you seek; if so, you can use LINK+ to have the document delivered here.
- Catalog of U.S. Government Publications (CGP): Maintained by the Government Printing Office (GPO), this search engine includes all documents distributed to depository libraries from 1976 to the present; many are available as full-text documents online. See also the CGP Search tips/Help page for more information.
- DocumentCloud: Searchable collection of primary source documents uploaded to Document Cloud. Includes many government-related documents requested via FOIA.
- GovernmentAttic.org: Provides electronic copies of thousands of federal government documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.
- Govinfo.gov: Digitized materials from all three branches of government.
- Law Library of Congress: American Indian constitutions and legal materials, military legal resources, serial set, piracy trials, United States treaties, and more.
- WorldCat: WorldCat is a union catalog of materials in libraries in the U.S. and internationally. If you cannot find a document via our catalog/LINK+, or access the document online via the CGP, you may be able to arrange an interlibrary loan depending on where an item resides.
On occasion, a document may be old or obscure and remain uncataloged, or your citation may be incomplete or incorrect. In this case, you may find the document in one of the following indexes:
