American Governmental Institution Resources

American Governmental Institution Resources

California Governmental Institutions and Resources

California: Your Government
Links to information on California's elected officials, courts, state agencies, local government, voting and elections, regulations, etc.
California Voting and Elections
Find voter registration information and eligibility requirements for voting; browse ballot propositions and election results for state and national elections in 1996. View legislative and congressional district maps for California. Learn about elections, candidates, parties and PACS including financial information and voting statistics; download the National Mail Voter Registration Form to register to vote from anywhere in the U.S.
California Courts
View the structure of the court system in California with 100 Municipal Courts, 58 Superior Courts, 18 Courts of Appeal and 1 Supreme Court. Link to a selective list of California municipal and superior court web sites. Read full-text opinions of the California Supreme Court and the California Courts of Appeal. Browse publications available from the Judicial Branch; learn about the Judicial Council of California; link to the Administrative Office of the Court and more.
Laws, Codes and Regulations
See all 29 of California's legal code sections (the laws of the state) with a subject and keyword search. Browse a searchable index of all California bills passed through both houses of the Legislature; access statutes by subject and keyword search. Also, Examine the text of current public laws enacted by the U.S. Congress. Browse the major bills and amendments currently before Congress by topic, title, bill number or by those enacted into law. Search the text of public regulations issued by the agencies of the Federal government.

California Issues and Problems

Little Hoover Commission
Created in 1962 by the California legislature, the Little Hoover Commission (Milton Marks "Little Hoover" Commission on California State Government Organization and Economy) is a bipartisan, independent body whose function is to promote efficiency, effectiveness and economy in state programs. Its reports cover investigations into issues which are important to the legislature, and affect lawmaking.
Legislative Analyst's Office Index of Publications (1993-97)
The Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO) provides analysis and nonpartisan advice to the California Legislature on fiscal and policy issues, and has done so for over fifty years. The LAO enjoys a national reputation for its fiscal and programmatic expertise, and its high quality, nonpartisan analyses. Many of the reports are available online. Scroll down their page and click on any that you want to read or use.

General American National Government Resources

Federal Web Locator
One of the most comprehensive guides to federal agencies, departments and government information. Note: Be sure to scroll down the page to see the table of contevts, organized according to branch of government.
Federal Government Resources on the Web
Information on many government agencies and departments are available from this website provided by the University of Michigan Documents Center. Excellent starting place for research on any area of the U.S. government.
U.S. Government Information Sources
Access to federal government information organized by the National Technology Transfer Center. Click on the branch of government your agency or organization is part of, and follow the pathway to the website. You may also search by the name of the agency with their search engine.

Links to specific branches of government (Presidency, Congress, Courts) are listed immediately below.) Also check the bottom of this page for additional general government resources.

The Presidency

The White House
The Web Page of the Office of the President of the United States.
The Presidents of the United States of America
From the White House, a series of articles on the Presidents of the U.S., including inaugural addresses and quotations. Also has links to additional resources on each president.
Presidents of the United States
The Internet Public Library has an excellent collection of links to information about all U.S. Presdients. Just click on a presidential link, and his special page will be brought up. Then click on: Election Results, Cabinet Members, Presidency Highlights, Internet Biographies, Historical Documents, Media Resources, Fast Facts, or Other Internet Resources for information in those areas.
The Presidential Record
This collection of information about U.S. Presidents is provided by the Public Broadcasting service, to accompany their PBS Television series: The Presidents. See sections:" Snap Shot, The Era, Domestic Policy, Foerign policy, and Presidential Politics-- in order to get a feel for their work, life and times.
Inaugural Addresses of the Presidents
This collection is being published in commemoration of the Bicentennial Presidential Inauguration that was observed on January 20, 1989. Dedicated to the institution of the Presidency and the democratic process that represents the peaceful and orderly transfer of power according to the will of the people.
Imperial Presidency
Brief definition and examples of the meaning of the term: Imperial Presidency.
Richard Nixon's Thoughts On the Presidency
The thoughts of Richard Nixon on the Presidency, written just before his death. Includes comments on the idea of The Imperial Presidency.
The Imperial Presidency's New Vestments
Lengthy essay about how the office of the President has expanded its powers beyond what the Constitution allows.
Global Interventionism and aa New Imperial Presidency
Overview of a policy paper, with link to the full report, produced by the conservative political think tank, the Cato Institute.

The U.S. Senate and House of Representatives

The U.S. Senate
The official United States Senate website Check on the work of individual senators, creation of laws in the Senate, and how the Senate operates-- plus other useful information.
The U.S. House Of Representatives
Listing of all information available with regards to the U.S. House of Representatives. Just about anything you might want to know about our country's laws and the legislative process is available here.
Congressional Quarterly's American Voter
Huge amount of information on national politics/politicians: especially Congress and the Presidency. Includes Election Results, News From Washington, plus voting records, political history, speeches and legislation of each member of congress. There is not much missing!
105th Congress: Search House and Senate Bills
Full text of House and Senate proposed and passed laws. Has text of 105th Congress, and allows searching of two prior Congressional sessions.
THOMAS
U.S. Senate and House of Representatives: legislative information provided by the Library of Congress. Find out about future laws being considered, as well as changes to current law here.
Congressional Research Service Reports
A series of informative reports on how Congress operates, its organization, and history is offered here. Mostly focuses on the House of Representatives.
The U.S. House of Representatives: The Legislative Process
The Legislative Process page provides access to a wealth of information about bills and resolutions being considered in the Congress, as well as current information about what's happening on the House floor. A summary of the categories of information is listed under Legislative Process Information.

The Nation's Laws and the Courts

The United States Code
Search this database for the full text of the laws of the land. Or, if it is easier for you, use the Table of Contents at the bottom of the site to see laws according to their subject.
Laws and Legal Information By Subject
Cornell University provides a list of topic summaries with links to key primary source material and offnet references can be accessed through: a set of broad topic categories, and an alphabetical listing of topics, and a searchable index. Their commentaries and references are an excellent place to learn about the legal background of various issues. Just start with the general subject area, and follow the pathways to more specific topics.
FindLaw
Knowing the law helps understand government, and vice versa. This site organizes useful links to resources where you can find vast amounts of information about laws on certain subjects. Very helpful. Good place to start looking!
U.S. Supreme Court Decisions
The United States Supreme Court decides on the interpretation of laws passed by Congress. This site allows access to many of those decisions made since 1990. Also includes information about the Court, and links to selected Historic Supreme Court Decisions.
Supreme Court Cases
Search the FindLaw database for many U.S. Supreme Court opinions on cases that are not covered by the recent and historic databases. Fills some of the gap between 1975-1990. If you didn't find it there, try here.
Historic File of U.S.Supreme Court Decisions
This system contains the full text of 7,407 U.S. Supreme Court Decisions from 1937 to 1975. Decisions are avialable as ASCII text files that can be read on your browser's screen or saved to your hard drive and accessed by using most word processor programs. Most Decisions are very large and may take a while to download if you have a slow internet connection. After conducting a search, the search results screen lists the size of the Decision in bytes so that you can esimate download times.
U.S. Supreme Court Cases
USSC+, a commercial database provider allows online access to its collection of over 5,000 U.S. Supreme Court decisions.
Supreme Court Resources
FindLaw's page that offers court calendar, court rules, Real Audio recordings of the Oral Arguments, Law Journal Extra! news stories, Justices' biographical information and Cornell's free e-mail update service.
U.S. Constitution and Related Court Cases
FindLaw's excellent set of resources with annotations from the Congressional Research Service Library of Congress with links to cited Supreme Court Cases.
U.S. Supreme Court News From The Washington Post
One of the nation's leading newspapers offers access to articles about the U.S. Supreme Court and the cases tried there.
Anatomy of a Murder: A Trip Through Our Nation's Legal Justice System
"YOU will be able to follow the story of a defendant as he faces one of the most serious charges that the legal justice system of the United States of America can levy against an individual. This is more than an exciting fictional story, however."

More General Federal Government Resources

Government Documents in the News
Often we hear of some momentous event of news, and don't realize that there is some document or written information from the government that relates to the news event. Here is a place that gathers links to such documents.
Social Security History
Exceptionally well presented collection of information on the history of the Social Security program and Social Security Administration. A mix of general-interest material and items that may appeal primarily to scholars. Graphics and photos abound, and there are sound and video clips.

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