translate
Blog

Presidential Documents Online

By Thomas Baer •  February 14, 2019
  •  

Presidents’ Day, the day celebrating George Washington’s birth, became a federal holiday in 1879. The day was celebrated on February 22nd each year, until a 1968 law mandated that many federal holidays be noticed on Mondays. We now celebrate Presidents’ Day on the third Monday of February. In celebration of Presidents’ Day, check out the many Presidential resources available freely online.

The Public Papers of the Presidents compile Presidential writings, addresses, and remarks. These documents have been published by the Office of the Federal Register, National Archives and Records Administration since 1957. Access the Public Papers of the Presidents online at GovInfo or the National Archives.

The Law Librarians’ Society of Washington, DC has compiled links to major sources for materials including Presidential directives, proclamations, signing statements, executive orders, memoranda, and other documents.

The Library of Congress Digital Collections: American History includes papers and essays from or about select U.S. Presidents.

The collection includes:

George Washington
Thomas Jefferson
James Madison
James Monroe
Andrew Jackson
Martin Van Buren
William Henry Harrison
John Tyler
James K. Polk
Zachary Taylor
Franklin Pierce
Abraham Lincoln
Ulysses S. Grant
Theodore Roosevelt
Woodrow Wilson

For more ways to find Presidential documents, including Jenkins membership databases, see our Presidential Documents research guide.

Need help finding Presidential documents? Ask us!

More from the blog

Federal Government
January 5, 2021
govinfo logo

Guides and Tutorials for Using govinfo

govinfo , a service of the United States Government Publishing Office (GPO), provides a wealth of federal government information for free. This includes the United States Code (USC), the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), executive agency materials, Congressional materials, and much more. govinfo...
Congress.gov
January 29, 2019

Congressional Research Services (CRS) Reports

Last fall, Dr. Carla Hayden, the Librarian of Congress, announced that the library had begun to provide Congressional Research Service (CRS) reports to the public for the first time in history. Authored by experts, CRS reports provide policy and legal analysis, offering multiple perspectives on...
Federal Government
January 22, 2019

Find the United States Code on govinfo

The U.S. Code is available on govinfo.gov , a service of the U.S. Government Publishing Office (G.P.O.). Govinfo has the U.S. Code from 1994 to present and it can be browsed or searched. To find and browse the U.S.C., use the "Browse by Category" option: The U.S.C. is located in the "Bills and...