HISTORY 363: China and World War II in Asia (Spring 2022) : Full-text government publication collections in English with pre-1945 documents

Foreign Relations of the United States, 1861-1988

• Official documentary historical record of major U.S. foreign policy decisions that have been declassified and edited for publication.
• Produced by the State Department's Office of the Historian.
• Most documents are diplomatic reports and correspondence.
• Available from three sources
  • Hein Online, 1861-1988, most comprehensive, and easiest to search.
  • University of Wisconsin-Madison’s digital collections, 1861-1960
    • Search across all FRUS volumes by clicking and typing in the "Search Text Within" box in the upper right.
    • View individual volumes by scrolling to "Available Contents" and clicking the title of a volume.
      • Search within that specific volume by clicking and typing in the "Search Text Within" box in the upper right.
  • State Department's Office of the Historian, 1961-1988

Public Papers of the Presidents, 1789-present

• Contain most of the President's public messages, statements, speeches, and news conference remarks.
• Documents such as Proclamations, Executive Orders, and similar documents that are published in the Federal Register and the Code of Federal Regulations, as required by law, are usually not included for the presidencies of Herbert Hoover through Gerald Ford (1929-1977).
• Documents within the Public Papers are arranged in chronological order.
• The President delivered the remarks or addresses from Washington, D. C., unless otherwise indicated.
• The White House in Washington issued statements, messages, and letters unless noted otherwise.
• Available online from three sources:
  • American Presidency Project from the University of California-Santa Barbara, 1789-present (though mostly from 1913- ).
    • Scroll down the page a bit for the "simple search."
    • Advanced search provides more options and structure.
  • University of Michigan Digital Library, 1928-2000 (does not include the papers of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
  • U.S. Presidential Library (Hein Online)

ProQuest Congressional, 1789-present

• Comprehensive, ongoing collection of U.S. Congressional publications from the late 18th century to the present.
• Includes acts, committee reports, hearings testimony, regulations, legislative histories, the Congressional Record, the Serial Set & American State Papers.
• Also includes documents published by Executive Branch agencies 1789-1932.
• Updated annually.
• Can limit searches to particular kinds of documents, such as hearings, or the Congressional Record.
• More help with this database is available from ProQuest's guides to this database.
  • Guide to Congressional Help: Citing: a guide from ProQuest on how to cite documents found in this database.
  • The UW-Madison Libraries use the advanced search as a default. Here's a guide to the advanced search.

Hathi Trust, all dates (but best for U.S. gov docs, and books published before 1923)

• Full-text of works that are out of copyright or in the public domain (including many U.S. federal publications) are available for viewing or searching.
• Items are also in Google Books but have greater availability and searchability in Hathi Trust.
• In the cases of "limited-view" documents, you can search documents for specific words, but would have to find print copies using the library catalog or WorldCat.
• You can log in with your partner institution account to access the largest number of volumes and features. To log in, click “Log in” in the upper right, and select your institution’s name from the menu.
• Updated continuously.

Foreign Office Files for China, 1919-1980

• British Foreign Office files dealing with China, Hong Kong and Taiwan between 1919 and 1980.
• These formerly restricted British government documents consist of diplomatic dispatches, letters, newspaper cuttings, maps, reports of court cases, biographies of leading personalities, and summaries of events.
• Periods covered include:
  • 1919-1929: ​Kuomintang, CCP and the Third International
  • 1930-1937: The Long March, civil war in China and the Manchurian Crisis
  • 1938-1948: Open Door, Japanese war and the seeds of communist victory
• Just above each list of search results, look for the phrase Refined by: Foreign Office Files for China, 1919-1980. If this phrase does NOT appear, you're searching a much bigger collection, and probably want to
  1. Click "Collection" to the right of "Browse by."
  2. Select "Foreign Office Files for China, 1919-1980."
  3. Click "Apply."
  Otherwise, your search results will be much less focused.

U.K. Parliamentary Papers, 1688-2004

• Includes all of the papers issued by the House of Commons between 1715 through the 21st century in all formats, including: Bills, Reports of Royal Commissions, Reports of Select Committees, Accounts and Papers, Command Papers.
• All papers are full-text searchable with hit-term highlighting.
• Includes full text from Hansard, the Official Report of debates in Parliament, from both the House of Commons and House of Lords, from 1803-2005.

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