LibGuides: Government Documents: About

Government Documents at Reed

Reed College used to receive approximately 38 percent of U.S. government publications distributed to libraries in paper, microfiche, and CD-ROM formats from 1912 - 2012. Most government documents currently in the collection are from online sources. Access to the collection and to U.S. federal depository government information on the internet is available to members of the Reed community and to the general public.

For more information about the collection or help locating a document, contact:

govdocs@reed.edu

https://library.reed.edu/ask.html

The collection contains many historical series with holdings dating from the nineteenth century. Highlights of the collection include:

Primary documentation of the United States Congress, including online access to the Serial Sets, public laws, congressional reports and documents, transcripts of hearings, and the Congressional Record.
Publications of the executive branch, including presidential speeches and public statements and proposed rules and regulations.
Supreme Court decisions.
Publications on American foreign policy from the U.S. Department of State.
Historical statistical series issued by many government agencies, including the Census Bureau, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the Department of Health and Human Services.

The Reed College documents collection is shelved by Superintendent of Documents (SuDoc) number in the Center Stacks, Lower Level 1. In addition to the paper collection, many government documents are issued as microfiche. They are filed by SuDoc number in the Microforms Room and available by request. Selected high-use or special format government documents are housed in the Reference Room or in other parts of the library. These materials may be located using the library catalog.

Reed's library reference collection contains several databases, catalogs, and indexes that can be used to locate any government publication, not just those in its own documents collection. U.S. documents not available at Reed may be borrowed from other depository libraries in the area.