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Some things to think about Government Documents:
“The Federal Depository Library Program (44 USC 19) provides for the establishment and maintenance of depository libraries and the distribution of Government documents to those libraries for use by the public.” (Federal Depository Library Manual 1993, p2)

What is a Government Document?
Anything published by a government agency.

What does one look like?

It could be anything, or just about anything. The government publishes books, pamphlets, CDs, DVDs, maps, slip laws, congressional reports etc. So they come in all shapes and sizes. This is important when looking for documents on the shelves. It is easy for a pamphlet from the Social Security office to get lost between books. In order to prevent this some libraries try to group the small items together on a shelf.


Government Printing Office, Washington D.C.

What are Government Documents about?
Government Documents are about darn near everything. Not only can you find Senate and House hearings/reports/committee findings you can also find census statistics, nuclear testing papers, Social Security information, information on protected species, diplomat listings, geology data, recipe books etc. Every department that is a part of our U.S. Government comes out with publications which are then available to the public.

The organization of Government Documents: Superintendent of Documents (SuDoc) Classification
Each agency or bureau has a unique letter or combination of letters and numbers assigned to it that appear before the colon of the SuDocs number. The SuDocs classification system is based on government author, for example publications by NASA are filed under NAS and publications done by congress are under Y. The basis for this system was first developed by Miss Adelaide R. Hasse while working for the Los Angeles Public Library. It was further refined by the Library of the Government Printing Office during the years of 1895 through 1903. Since then every item published by our government be it paper or electronic is assigned a SuDocs number.

The SuDocs classification system differs from the Library of Congress (LC) or Dewey Decimal classification systems in a few ways: one, SuDocs is not a decimal system and two it classifies documents by author. The author in this case are the various departments, bureaus and agencies of the US Government, not people. Also the organizational structure of SuDocs mimics the US Government: subordinate bureaus and divisions are grouped with the parent organization. For example: TD is the Transportation Department, TD 4. is the Federal Aviation Administration which is a part of the Transportation Department. (GPO 1993, 1) There are also further divisions for regular publications, for example the FAA airworthiness directive biweekly listing is:

TD 4.10/4:

This letter number combination before the colon is known as the “class stem.” After the colon is then year or issue number of the publication, so:

TD 4.10/4:91-19

Is the listing for the FAA airworthiness directive biweekly listing, issue 91-19.

This arrangement has both advantages and pitfalls. The plus is that as our government grows so does SuDocs, new headings are created when new departments are created. However, this also means that if a department closes no new documents will ever be published with that SuDocs heading. (GPO 1993 vi) The downside to this is that older agencies who have had name changes will have their publications in multiple places depending on the year of the publication.

The intermixing of numbers, letters, colons and dashes are sometimes confusing. So, if you ever have difficulty finding what you need or are confused about organization feel free to ask a librarian for assistance!

For further information on the SuDocs classification system you may try these resources:

GPO Classification Manual, SuDocs number: GP 3.29:P 88

The Federal Depository Library Program (FDLP) on the web at:

http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fdlp/pubs/explain.html

Monthly Catalog:
On January 12, 1895 the fifty third congress of the United States of America passed “an act for the public printing and binding and the distribution of public documents.” (53 U.S.S.L. 601) The index for all of these publications is the Monthly Catalog.

The Monthly Catalog of United States Publications is issued once a month and lists all of the public documents printed by the US Government in the previous month. Each entry lists a publication’s title, where to find it at, as well as the price of the publication.

Entries are NOT in alphabetical order, but in Superintendent of Documents (SuDocs) classification order. This way you may look up all titles published by a department for the month. For example: to look up papers published by the President of the United States, which in the SuDocs system is the PRs, you would flip to the PR heading in the Monthly Catalog. Also to aid in publication searches is a title keyword index located in the back of every Monthly Catalog.

The Monthly Catalog is available online at: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/cgp

It is also important to note that the Printing Act of 1895, section 52 states that: “That no publication reprinted from such stereotype or electrotype plates and no other Government publication shall be copyrighted.” (53 U.S.S.L. 608) This means that all things published by our government is “public domain” and may be used with out the author’s consent.

United States Statutes at Large and the United States Code
The United States Statutes at Large is a series of volumes containing all public laws, private laws, concurrent resolutions and presidential proclamations passed by congress and the president. Laws within the United States Statutes at Large are listed in chronological order of date passed, volumes are ordered by congressional session.

From 1789 to 1844, congress had no organized way of printing their laws. In 1845 they hired an outside firm, Little, Brown and Company, to print all United States Laws in chronological order. Little, Brown and Company continued to print the US Statutes at Large until 1873. Between the years of 1873 to 1936 the Government Printing office published pamphlets of session laws (also known as slip laws) which would later be bound into book form. These are volumes 18 through 49 of the US Statutes at Large. Finally in 1937 the Government Printing Office began to publish the US Statutes at Large in book form annually. They continue this annual publication to this day. (Queen’s University)

While the United States Statutes at Large is considered the “law authority” it is not easy for people looking for laws by subject to work through. So, in order to find laws relevant to one another due to subject there is the United States Code. The United States Code made its first appearance in 1926; new editions are published every six years.

The most popular feature of the U.S. Code is the legislative histories contained within. A legislative history starts with the introduction of a bill and lists all of the votes, congressional hearings and amendments associated with a bill on through to the approval of that bill into a law.

It is important to note however, that not all US laws are included in the United States Code. The US Code only contains laws pertinent to the US public. Therefore there are no private laws listed in the US Code.

You can search the United States Code through GPO access at: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/uscode/index.html
Or through Cornell University’s Law site:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/

Comments:

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2007-05-13 20:18:00   Here is a tinylogo.png to consider using when you set up this wiki. —JasonAller

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2007-05-14 03:27:21   Hey Rhianna, welcome! To create a wiki you'll want to head over to the Create a wiki page, in case you didn't already know (this is just a page on the wiki spot hub — not a wiki in of itself). You were probably trying to create a page about the wiki you're starting — so you'll want to rename this page to the name of the wiki (like the Davis Wiki or Sacramento Wiki pages here on the hub) and then link it from the Wiki Directory page.

We can help with this stuff, I just wanted to drop you a note so you knew what was up. —PhilipNeustrom