Historical Documents

Resources in this category:

A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation: U.S. Congressional Documents and Debates
http://rs6.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lawhome.html

"A Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation consists of a linked set of published congressional records of the United States of America from the Continental Congress through the 43rd Congress, 1774-1875. It includes the Journals of the Continental Congress (1774-89); the Letters of Delegates to Congress (1774-89); the Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, or Farrand's Records," and more.

Amendments to the Constitution
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/index.html

Here are the Amendments to the U.S. Constitution with dates and states ratifing the amendment.

American Memory: Historical Collections for the National Digital Library
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/index.html

Multimedia collections of historical digitized documents, photographs, recorded sound, moving pictures, and text from the Library of Congress's Americana collections. May be browsed by title/topic/format or searched via engine.

American Memory: Library of Congress Map Collections, 1544-1996
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/gmdhtml/gmdhome.html

"The Geography and Map Division of the Library of Congress holds more than 4.5 million items, of which Map Collections represents only a small fraction, those that have been converted to digital form. The focus of Map Collections is Americana and Cartographic Treasures of the Library of Congress. These images were created from maps and atlases and, in general, are restricted to items that are not covered by copyright protection. Map Collections is organized according to seven major catagories.." These catagories include Cities and Towns, Conservation and Envrionment, Discovery and Exploration, Immigration and Settlement, Military Battles and Campaigns, Transportation and Communication, and General Maps. There is also a link to the Geography and Map Division of the Library of Congress.

Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution
http://www.aaa.si.edu/

Archive of "letters, diaries, and scrapbooks of artists, dealers, and collectors; manuscripts of critics and scholars; business records of museums, galleries, and associations; photographs; works of art on paper; and oral history interviews." Digital collections can be browsed by theme or searched by keyword.

Archiving Early America
http://www.earlyamerica.com/

Archiving Early America is a source of historical materials from 18th Century America. Collections include original newspapers, maps and writings of the time.

Authentic History Center – Primary Sources from American Popular Culture
http://www.authentichistory.com/

This not-for-profit website is filled with numerous types of media drawn directly from numerous periods in American History. Images of Pro-War sentiment, racist propaganda, coins, and electoral buttons are only some of the interesting artifacts to be found here. All of these artifacts are presented according to eras in American History, dating back to the Antebellum and stretching forward to the present.

Brooklyn Daily Eagle Online (1841-1902)
http://www.brooklynpubliclibrary.org/eagle/

A digitized collection of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. The site currently contains issues from 1841-1902, with expansions planned. Hosted by the Brooklyn Public Library.

California Gold: Northern California Folk Music from the Thirties - American Folklife Center
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/afccchtml/cowhome.html

This WPA project documents a representative collection of folk music being actively performed in Northern California in the 1930s. It comprises 35 hours of folk music recorded in 12 languages representing numerous ethnic groups and 185 musicians, as well as song transcriptions and research, photographs, drawings, field reports, and articles.

Colonists and Native Americans
http://history.hanover.edu/project.html#17

This Website offers historical documents: "Texts and Archives: First Thanksgiving Proclamation (MS State)/ Secondary Sources/ New Meet Old Americans (Knowledge Adventure)/ History of Jamestowne (Jamestowne Society)/ The Real Pocahontas by Jessica Ronky (Times)/ The Chicora Indians (Pride Net)// Resources: Pride Net: Native American Resources/ Native American Legal Resources (WisBar)/" "Texts and Documents" This Website is a part of the Texts and Documents project at Hanover College.

Constitution of the United States of America
http://www.law.cornell.edu:80/constitution/constitution.over...

Includes Preamble, Articles I-VII (The Legislative Branch, the Presidency, the Judiciary, the States, the Amendment Process, Legal Status of the Constitution, Ratification), and Amendments I-XXVII, as well as list of signers. In this hypertext version of the Constitution, provisions that have been amended or otherwise affected by subsequent amendments are linked to the relevant amendments.

Core Documents of U.S. Democracy
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/coredocs.html

Texts of historical and current government documents, including: Declaration of Independence, Constitution of the U.S., Articles of Confederation, Gettysburg Address, Supreme Court Decisions, Economic Indicators, Government Manual, Statistical Abstract of the United States, and the federal budget.

Documenting the American South: Beginnings to 1920
http://docsouth.unc.edu/

"'Documenting the American South' (DAS) is a full-text database of primary resources on Southern history, literature and culture from the colonial period through the first decades of the 20th century. Currently, DAS includes three digitization projects: slave narratives, first-person narratives, and Southern literature. A fourth, based on Confederate imprints, is in development. The Main Library System at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill sponsors this database, and the texts come primarily from its Southern collections. An Editorial Board guides its development."

Documents from the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention, 1774-1789
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/continental/

"The Continental Congress Broadside Collection (253 titles) and the Constitutional Convention Broadside Collection (21 titles) contain 274 documents relating to the work of Congress and the drafting and ratification of the Constitution. Items include extracts of the journals of Congress, resolutions, proclamations, committee reports, treaties, and early printed versions of the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. Most Broadsides are one page in length, others range from 1 to 28 pages."

The Dred Scott Case
http://www.library.wustl.edu/vlib/dredscott/

"In 1846, Dred Scott and his wife Harriet filed suit for their freedom in the St. Louis Circuit Court. This suit began an eleven-year legal fight that ended in the U.S. Supreme Court, which issued a landmark decision declaring that Scott remain a slave. This decision contributed to rising tensions between the free and slave states just before the American Civil War. The records displayed in this exhibit document the Scotts' early struggle to gain their freedom through litigation and are the only extant records of this significant case as it was heard in the St. Louis Circuit Court."

The Emancipation Proclamation
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/index.html

President Lincoln's famous proclamation: see the original document and read a full text transcription. This monumental work from the Civil War declares all slaves free in the rebellious South, and allows black men to enter the U.S. military.

Federal Government Resources: Historical Documents
http://www.lib.umich.edu/govdocs/fedhis.html

A portal to government documents from throughout American History, hosted by the University of Michigan Documents Center.

The Federalist Papers
http://memory.loc.gov/const/fed/fedpapers.html

After the United States Constitution was ratified, The Federalist Papers argued the merits of becoming part of the Union. This site breaks the Federalist Papers into each paper from Federalist Paper No.1 to Federalist Paper No.85.

Florida Memory Project: The Florida State Archives
http://fpc.dos.state.fl.us/memory/

"Provides a web-based structure for primary records that illustrates significant moments in the state's history, provides educational resources for students of all ages, and makes available collections useful for historical research. Each component of the Florida Memory Project utilizes original documents, photographs, and other materials from the collections of the Florida State Archives."

Freedom of Information Act Electronic Reading Room
http://foia.fbi.gov/

The FBI has placed on-line some of its most frequently-requested documents released under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). FBI Documents related to celebrities, spies, gangsters, crime, and unusual phenomena are available for your perusal.

George Washington's Inaugural Address
http://www.archives.gov/exhibit_hall/american_originals/inau...

This is the first U.S. inaugural speech given by George Washington. This site provides the full text and some photos of the original document speech.

The Gettysburg Address
http://lcweb.loc.gov/exhibits/gadd/

Here you will find images of two of the versions of the Gettysburg Address, the Nicholay Draft and the Hay Draft, and also the text. This is President Lincoln's address at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to keep the war going in the effort to keep the Union together.

Immigration to the United States, 1789-1930
http://ocp.hul.harvard.edu/immigration/

Photographs, books and pamphlets, maps, manuscripts, and other archival material drawn from the collections of Harvard University that document voluntary immigration to the United States "from the signing of the Constitution to the onset of the Great Depression," and related quantitative data and contextual information.

JFK-Dallas, November 22, 1963
http://www.dallasnews.com/s/dws/spe/2003/jfk/112203jfk.html

Provides news stories, personal perspectives, maps and photographs, and audio and video relating to U.S. President John F. Kennedy's 1963 assassination.

Kappler's Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties
http://digital.library.okstate.edu/kappler/

Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties, compiled and edited by Charles J. Kappler, is a seven volume compilation of U.S. treaties, laws and executive orders pertaining to Native American Indian tribes.

Lewis and Clark and the Corps of Discovery
http://lib.virginia.edu/digital/collections/text/lewis_clark...

Featuring "two editions of the Journals of Lewis and Clark; the published journal (1810) of Patrick Gass, a member of the Corps of Discovery; and the catalog of George Catlin's "Indian Gallery" (1837), painted on his travels with William Clark from 1830-1834."

Library of Congress
http://www.loc.gov/

"The Library of Congress is using the World Wide Web (WWW) to present information about and materials from its collections over the Internet." It's also possible to view Internet exhibits that cover American history, get legislative information, access resources for researchers and information professionals, and find out more about the Library of Congress and what it does. Instructions for searching the Library of Congress catalogs are available in English or Spanish.

Making of America
http://moa.cit.cornell.edu/moa/

"Making of America (MOA) is a digital library of primary sources in American social history from the antebellum period through reconstruction. The collection is particularly strong in the subject areas of education, psychology, American history, sociology, religion, and science and technology. The collection contains approximately 1,600 books and 50,000 journal articles with 19th century imprints. The project represents a major collaborative endeavor in preservation and electronic access to historical texts. The Making of America collection is made up of images of the pages in the books and journals. When you find something you want to look at, you will see a scanned image of the actual pages of the 19th century volume." The site is searchable and browsable.

National Archives and Records Administration
http://www.archives.gov/

Includes a comprehensive list of archival information maintained by various branches of the Federal government, as well as online exhibits, educational material, and information about programs and events sponsored by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA).

National Archives Online Exhibit Hall
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/

Multimedia features from our nation's past! The National Archives publishes historic documents like the Louisiana Purchase, Nixon's resignation letter, posters from World War II, Portrait of Black Chicago (a photo exhibit), and lots more!

National Constitution Center
http://www.constitutioncenter.org/

The National Constitution Center is a non-profit organization that works to increase understanding of the U.S. Constitution. The site includes the full text of the Constitution, including a variety of interactive tools designed to explain the document. Also includes links to information about other U.S. historical documents, resources for teachers, and a section for kids.

The National Security Archive
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/

"The National Security Archive is an independent non-governmental research institute and library located at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. The Archive collects and publishes declassified documents acquired through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)." View selected documents at this site on topics ranging from the Cuban Missile Crisis to the Nixon-Elvis meeting.

Ohio Memory Online Scrapbook
http://www.ohiomemory.org/index.html

The Ohio Memory Online Scrapbook is a digital library of primary source materials related to Ohio history. The collection's 25,000 images cover the period from pre-history to the present. Users can search or browse the collection, and the site includes special exhibits and resources for teachers and students.

Online Searchable Death Indexes & Records
http://www.deathindexes.com/

This website gathers links to online death indexes by state and county. Included are death records, death certificate indexes, obituaries, probate indexes, and cemetery and burial records. Information about searching the Social Security Death Index online is also included.

The Oyez Project
http://www.oyez.org/oyez/frontpage

"The OYEZ Project contains many hundreds of hours of audio materials..." and "...dozens of panoramic images of the Supreme Court Building. The Project provides abstracts and other materials for leading cases in constitutional law decided by the Supreme Court of the United States." Cases are searchable by citation, title, subject or date.

Pearl Harbor Radiogram
http://www.archives.gov/exhibit_hall/american_originals/fdr....

"President Roosevelt's famous "Day of Infamy" speech was a call to arms. One day after the attack, he expressed outrage at Japan and confidence in the "inevitable triumph" of the United States. On December 8 the United States declared war against Japan; on December 11 Germany and Italy declared war against the United States." Here you will find images of the speech, the text declaring war by President Franklin Roosevelt, and an image of the radiogram reporting the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Pioneering the Upper Midwest: Books from Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin, ca. 1820-1910
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/umhtml/umhome.html

"Portrays the states of Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin from the seventeenth to the early twentieth century through first-person accounts, biographies, promotional literature, local histories, ethnographic and antiquarian texts, colonial archival documents, and other works drawn from the Library of Congress's General Collections and Rare Books and Special Collections Division. The collection's 138 volumes depict the land and its resources; the conflicts between settlers and Native peoples; the experience of pioneers and missionaries, soldiers and immigrants and reformers; the growth of local communities and local cultural traditions; and the development of regional and national leadership in agriculture, business, medicine, politics, religion, law, journalism, education, and the role of women."

Primary Documents in American History
http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/PrimDocsHome.html

This site offers a list of some of the most important documents in American history from 1763 to 1877. Each document has a page with background information, links to digital material associated with the documents, and bibliographies for both adult and young readers.

FindLaw: U.S. Supreme Court Center
http://supreme.lp.findlaw.com/

"An educational resource site dedicated to the United States Constitution and the U.S. Supreme Court... Designed with students and the general public in mind, the FindLaw Constitutional Law Center features an easy-to-read guide that leads visitors through historical documents, biographies, and Supreme Court decisions. Users can browse through the Federalist Papers, read the Constitution, or research the lives of the Founding Fathers and Supreme Court Justices."

US Historical Documents
http://www.law.ou.edu/hist/

This site includes a chronology of US historical documents from pre-colonial era to the present. There are links to text-only versions of the documents and speeches.

Westward Exploration Collections
http://lib.virginia.edu/digital/collections/text/westward_ex...

"Early volumes related to westward exploration before and after the Meriwether Lewis and William Clark's Corps of Discovery. Many of the volumes are extensively illustrated." Includes works by George Catlin and John Woodhouse Audubon.

Women, Enterprise, and Society
http://www.library.hbs.edu/hc/wes/

Provides a guide to primary sources related to women entrepreneurs and women and work available at Baker Library at Harvard Business School, with particular focus on the 19th century. Includes a bibliography and links to web sites related to the history of women in business.