Government Information—Basic Guide

This guide provides a general description of the Federal Documents collection of the St. Mary's University Blume Library, including its organization, locations and basic methods of access. Government information is increasingly being made available only electronically, which means that our tangible collection is growing very little, while the universe of online government information becomes more important and more voluminous. A second section of the guide offers general guidance in navigating this universe, with descriptions of major government internet sites and a detailed description of the links available on the Library's Government Information web pages.

Within the text of this guide, indicates a printed (or microfiche) resource and indicates a web resource. Other Guides in this series cover specialized access methods and individual sections of the Collection, and specialized subject areas.

St. Mary's University Blume Library has been a selective depository for U.S. government publications (or documents) since 1964, one of over 1000 such libraries nationwide. We select various categories of publications which are "deposited" here by the Government Printing Office. The printed output of almost every Federal agency is represented in the collection but we have concentrated on publications from the Departments of Commerce, Labor, Justice, and the Congressional Committees, as well as non-medical items from HEW/HHS (Health, Education and Welfare/Health and Human Services). Although most material in the Collection was published in the 1960s or later, we do have some older items.

Unless a document is specifically marked for reference use only, it may be checked out by St. Mary's students, faculty or staff at the Circulation Counter.  See Library Circulation Policies.

The Federal Documents Collection is arranged by Superintendent of Documents classification numbers. These numbers are assigned in Washington and are used by most depository libraries. Each number consists of a letter identifying the issuing agency, followed by numbers and more letters to identify the specific publication. (See a detailed explanation of this classification system.)

Because of this arrangement, all publications from an agency (or Congressional Committee) will be found together on the shelf or in the microfiche drawer. Unfortunately, however, this system does not guarantee that all documents dealing with a particular subject will be found together. In order to find documents on a subject of interest, you must use the Online Catalog or one of the indexes described below.

In addition, reorganizations within government agencies are reflected in changes of Superintendent of Documents numbers, thereby occasionally scattering publications of a particular office or bureau over time.

Browsing can indeed turn up useful publications through serendipity. But it is not a reliable method of comprehensive research, especially in the Documents Collection.

Most of the Federal documents are shelved next to the Reference Collection on the main floor of the Library. Some titles are received in microfiche, and these documents are filed (by Superintendent of Documents classification number) in cabinets on the west side of the Library's main floor. Microfiche documents are weeded fairly often, so we do not have a large collection of older material in that format.

In addition, selected government periodicals are shelved on the first floor with the regular Periodicals Collection. These periodicals are inter-filed with the non-government titles, in alphabetical order.

In the early 1990s, the Government Printing Office began distributing some publications on Compact Disk (CD-ROM). Many of the CDs selected by the Blume Library contain Census information, but other agencies are also represented. These CDs are kept on Reserve and can be checked out for seven days. If printed documentation is available, it is kept with the CD on Reserve. Few CDs are currently received as this information is largely available through websites instead.

One last location for tangible documents is storage, where a few little-used, mostly older publications are kept. They may be retrieved by a librarian and checked out upon request.  Contact the Documents Librarian if you need to use material from storage.

Beginning with documents received in the fall of 1999, all material in the collection is represented in the Library's Online Catalog, with their special locations noted. We are also working to catalog all older material as well, and more than half of the collection is now represented in the catalog. The Documents Received List indicates which sections are completely cataloged. For comprehensive searches in other subject areas, it is still necessary to look in both the Online Catalog and the Government Publications Catalog.

If electronic versions of print publications are available, there will be links to the electronic versions in the Catalog. There are also hot-linked records for electronic-only publications in the Catalog. The "Location" for these items (given in the column next to the call number in the detailed display) is "Blume Online Service," and the call number is given as "ONLINE."

Catalog of Government Publications (1976–) This index (older issues are titled "Monthly Catalog of U.S. Government Publications") is the standard general index for Federal publications. It is possible to access information on documents published from July, 1976, to the present through this catalog provided by the Government Printing Office.

(1895-1976) Volumes of the Monthly Catalog, 1895-1934, are in microfilm on the First Floor. Paper volumes for 1933-1976 are in storage. They may be retrieved for consultation; ask a reference librarian, or contact the Documents Librarian if you need to use them.

USA.gov is a comprehensive and easy-to-use portal to online U.S. government information. It also indexes, somewhat less comprehensively, state and local government sites. In addition to browsing by subject and keyword searching (that includes useful limiting and filtering features) there are also links to services that can completed online, such as applying for jobs or student loans.

Browse Topics. This meta-site, maintained by the Government Printing Office and government information librarians around the country, provides subject access to electronic U.S. government information. If you are looking for a very recent electronic publication that might not yet be added to the subject listing, try GPO's "New Electronic Titles," a weekly list of newly produced (or discovered) government web sites and electronic publications.

Thomas (from the Library of Congress).  For a detailed description of what is included, click on "About Thomas" on the main page. The site includes:

• Bills and laws from recent years
• Congressional Record from recent years
• basic government information (including Constitution)
• links to House and Senate web pages and pertinent non-governmental pages

GPO Access and FDSys. Bills, Congressional Record, Federal Register, Government Accountability Office Reports, Catalog of Government Publications, and many other kinds of government publications are available in electronic format through GPO Access. Generally speaking, dates of coverage begin in the early to mid-1990's, but for some types of publications, older material is available. (New publications and databases are being added continually.) A special section, "Core Documents of U.S. Democracy," contains the full text of basic historical documents such as the Declaration of Independence, Constitution and the Federalist Papers; basic documents generated by the three branches of government (bills, laws, court decisions, regulations, budget); and basic statistical information.

Various collections of material are being migrated from GPO Access to the Government Printing Office's new FD(Federal Digital)Sys(tem). This new interface provides much more powerful searching capabilities, and for this reason we recommend using it for the collections of material that have made this transition. The main FDSys page lists these migrated collections. Eventually, all GPO Access content will be in FDSys and GPO Access search pages will direct users to the new interface.

Congressional Universe (1789-- ) This database is available for on-campus use AT THE LAW LIBRARY ONLY.

Congressional Universe offers many ways of searching their comprehensive database of Congressional information. All of the information contained in the printed CIS (Congressional Information Service) Indexes that the Library used to carry, is available, including its Legislative Histories; dates covered are 1970 to the present. A separate file, "Congressional Indexes," contains indexing information for hearings, prints, bills, laws, etc., from 1789-1969. Full text of many of these publications is available from the late 1980's to the present. New bills, laws and regulations are posted quickly; some other sections are updated less frequently. The database also includes information on members of Congress, including financial disclosure information and voting records.

• Public Policy Matrix. A useful outline of the workings of government, with links to appropriate resources at each point in the process (adapted from a page developed by Grace York at the University of Michigan)
• A Spanish-language government information page. In addition to this page of ours, there is a link to Federal Websites in Spanish, a page developed by the Oklahoma Dept. of Libraries
• Ben's Guide. Web site designed for children by the Government Printing Office
• America.gov. Current events and polcies, plus articles about our system of government
• Cybercemetery. A rchive of defunct government web pages maintained by the University of North Texas

• The Government Printing Office's depository library locator
• advice on citing government publications
• a page provided by Adobe which converts Adobe Acrobat (PDF) files to HTML (hypertext, web pages) or text files (many government publications are available only in PDF format; this converter can make such files viewable on computers which do not have the Adobe software available)

• Other Government-Related Sites
• International, intergovernmental, foreign governments, other states, non-governmental sites with useful information
• Copyright Information
• links to sources of copyright information (official agencies and informational sites and papers)

• Contact Your Legislator
• contact information (addresses, phone numbers, email and website addresses) for Texas' U.S. Senators and Representatives and State Senators and Representatives from the San Antonio area
• Government Information in San Antonio Libraries
• directory of San Antonio area libraries with government documents collections
• "Key Documents in San Antonio Area Libraries," which gives the print/micrform holdings of important government series in these libraries