Research Guides: Archival Research: Government Documents

Government Archives

Government archives, whether national, state, or municipal are quite massive, often holding millions of items. They usually have their own search tools, so when you are looking for digitized and/or analog government records, you can usually go straight to the website of an agency to search there.

Government records will also turn up in portals like the Digital Public Library of America and the Internet Archive, and in subscription databases like Ancestry Library Edition (NYPL).

On government agency websites, look for guides that explain how to use the collections. There may also be subject guides that show how to find materials on a particular topics in various formats from multiple collections or record groups. These research tools will speed your search and make it much easier to navigate the available resources.

Following are links to selected government archives and research tools. For further information and links to additional resources for finding government information, see the Gov't Info page in our Beyond Wikipedia research guide.

National Archives Around the World
List from Wikipedia of national archives in countries around the world.
State Archives
Contact information and links to state archives and historical societies in the U.S.
National Archives, U.S.
A massive resource. "NARA keeps only ... about 2 to 5 percent of [the records] generated in any given year. ... There are approximately 10 billion pages of textual records; 12 million maps, charts, and architectural and engineering drawings; 25 million still photographs and graphics; 24 million aerial photographs; 300,000 reels of motion picture film; 400,000 video and sound recordings; and 133 terabytes of electronic data." Plans are in place to digitize 500 million pages of records. See DOCS Teach and Reference at Your Desk. Also see: Research our Records / Explore a Specific Topic.
Democrary's Library - Internet Archive
"Democracy's Library brings together more than 700 collections from over 50 government organizations, archived by the Internet Archive since 2006." Currently includes nearly 1 million documents from local, regional, and national governments, with much more to be added. Find freely accessible government data, documents, records, and research.
National Archives Online Search Tools
Online portal for U.S. NARA catalogs, databases, research guides, finding aids, and other tools for finding records.
National Security Archive
Founded in 1985, this library and archive of declassified U.S. documents, center for investigative journalism, and research institute on international affairs includes a searchable collection of primary-source documents published on thier website.
FRASER: Discover Economic History
"[A] a digital library of U.S. economic, financial, and banking history—particularly the history of the Federal Reserve System."
New York State Archives - Research Topics
Guides to the most researched topics in the New York State Archives.
NYC Municipal Archives Online Gallery
Over 1.6 million images, including photographs, maps, documents, motion picture and audio recordings, including many complete collections.
Reclaim The Records
A not-for-profit activist group of genealogists, historians, researchers, and journalists that works to identify important genealogical record sets that are not online anywhere and not broadly available to the public. They use state Freedom of Information laws to force government agencies and archives to make these records available to the public. Since their founding in 2015, Reclaim the Records has won the release of tens of millions of records, which they have digitized and uploaded to the Internet Archive and other Open Data websites.