Continental Congress

• Congress of the United Colonies, 1774-1789
  • Presidents of the Continental Congress, some who could have been considered the first president

First Ladies

• Laura Welch Bush
  • Biography and portrait
• National First Ladies Library
  • Bibliography of books, articles, manuscripts, dissertations, and other printed resources in the library's collection arranged by name of the First Lady
  • Library news and objectives

Impeachment

• Impeachment Documents Relating to a U.S. President (Auburn University)
  • Full text of selected government documents relating to the impeachment of Andrew Johnson, Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton
  • Includes procedures, reports, and hearings
  • Text in Adobe Acrobat format
  • Under construction as of October 1998 but considerable progress made

• Impeachment Process
  • Documents Center coverage of President Clinton's road toward impeachment
  • Court cases, Starr report and responses, Congressional resolutions and hearings

Presidential Biographies

• American Experience (PBS)
  • Multimedia history of U.S. Presidents from Theodore Roosevelt to Harry Truman
  • Political campaign, presidential legacy, and contemporaneous cultural information
  • Launched on Sept. 8, 1997

• American Memory (Library of Congress)
  • Photographs of selected Presidential manuscripts
  • George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson available as of April 1999

• American Presidency Project (UCSB)
  • Unusual collection of historic party platforms since 1828, FDR fireside chats, Clinton/Bush Saturday radio addresses, and audio-video archives of the President
  • Also includes election results for President with voter turnout data, inaugural and State of the Union messages

• American Presidency (Grolier)
  • Articles include biographies of the Presidents, Vice Presidents, and famous candidates
  • Historic election results, political parties, Presidential scandals
  • Sections serve as a textbook for American government
  • Three encyclopedias available: New Book of Knowledge (Grades 3-8), Academic American Encyclopedia (Grade 5 to Adult), and Encyclopedia Americana (Grade 6 to Adult)

• Biographical Information (Ibiblio)
  • Links to web information about U.S. presidents beginning with George Washington
  • Usually includes biographies; may include links to schools attended and speeches
  • Part of the larger President web site which includes listings of Presidential libraries and information about the First Ladies

• Dead Presidents (Manus Hand)
  • Gravestones, obituaries, and biographies of presidents
  • Additional material may include a last will, audio of speeches, links to historic texts, archival records of assassinations
  • Despite title and some offbeat humor, this is a scholarly research web site

• Political Graveyard
  • Cemeteries in which over 100,000 federal, state and local politicians are buried
  • Arranged by name of person, office, birth and death years
  • Cemeteries arranged alphabetically and by state/county
  • Brief political biography of politician with links to fuller biographies as available
  • Cemetery lists provide biographies of politicians with some links to the Tiger Map Server
  • Extensive section on political families although relationships also shown under the name search

• Portraits of the Presidents
  • Portraits of presidents, Washington through Clinton, in the National Portrait Gallery
  • Brief Presidential biography and background on the painting
  • Thumbnail sketch and full screen version

• Presidents of the United States (IPL/Summers)
  • Extensive web site with pages for each President, Washington to Clinton
  • Picture, biographies, election results, first ladies, cabinets, highlights of administration, historical documents, and links to related Internet sites
  • Special attention paid to links describing historical events and biographies of cabinet members

• Presidents USA
  • Wonderfully complete compilation of information about the Presidents
  • Biographies, Presidential debates, birth and death information, use of the military, names of pets
  • Pictures, quotes, scandals
  • Top 20 vote getters in Presidential campaign did not always get elected!

• Trivia Web Sites
  • Detroit Free Press
  • Information Please Almanac
  • Presidential Facts Page
  • Presidents USA
  • University of Missouri - Kansas City

• What Makes A Good President (American Psychological Association)
  • Press release of presentation made at the American Psychological Association Convention on August 5, 2000
  • Identifies stubbornness and disagreeableness as the two most important personal characteristics for great presidents
  • Classifies past U.S. presidents into eight personality types

Presidential E-Mail

• President Bush: comments@whitehouse.gov
• Vice President Cheney: vice-president@whitehouse.gov

Comprehensive Sources

• American Presidency Project (UCSB)
  • Public Papers of the Presidents, 1929-1992
  • Complete run of State of the Union and Inaugural Addresses, 1789-present
  • Roosevelt Fireside Chats, 1933-44
  • National Party Platforms, 1840 to present
  • Additional materials only available to UCSB students

• Nixon Foundation
  • Serves as a Presidential museum and library
  • Excerpts of taped conversations on the overthrow of Vietnamese President Diem in 1962, the CIA, and Watergate in Word 97
  • Transcripts of additional Nixon letters and memoes
  • Public Papers of the President, 1969-74

• National Archives Archival Research Catalog
  • Bibliographic data base with many digitized images of federal documents
  • Includes declassified Presidential material
  • Rich source for President John F. Kennedy with speeches and foreign relations memoes
  • Holdings, photos and some text from the Hoover, Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Ford, Carter, Reagan, and Bush Libraries
  • Numerous search capabilities, including limitation to full text materials available on the web

• Papers of the Presidents (Yale/Avalon Project)
  • Full text of selected documents, including inaugural addresses, annual messages, proclamations, vetoes
  • As of May 2005, covers Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Polk, Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, Clinton, and George W. Bush (2001)

• Papers of Woodrow Wilson. (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1966-) Grad Stacks E 600 .W74

• Presidential Papers Microfilm (Library of Congress)

• Presidents of the United States (IPL/Summers)
  • Extensive web site with pages for each President, Washington to Clinton
  • Picture, biographies, election results, first ladies, cabinets, highlights of administration, historical documents, and links to related Internet sites
  • Special attention paid to links describing historical events and biographies of cabinet members

• Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States
  • Public Papers of the President, 1992+ (GPO)
    • Presidential speeches and statements issued by the Office of the Press Secretary on an annual basis
    • Declarations, nominations, and executive orders
    • Browsable and searchable
    • The Nixon Papers, 1969-74, are available from the Nixon Foundation
    • The Bush Administration papers, 1989-1993, are available from the Bush Presidential Library
    • Updated by Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, 1993+
    • The paper edition (Graduate Library Stacks J 80. A25) covers 1929-32 (Hoover) and 1945+ (Truman+)
    • Presidential Papers, 1929-1992, are available free of charge from the University of Michigan
    • Public Papers from 1789 to the present are available for free from theAmerican Presidency Project
    • Richardson's Compilation of the messages and papers of the presidents, 1789-1897 is located in Buhr as: J 81 .B96 and online through Project Gutenberg; The Abridgement (J 81 .83) includes summaries of executive department annual reports, 1858-1920
  • Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States, 1929-2000 (UMich)
    • Presidential speeches, executive orders, nominations and press releases for Herbert Hoover (1929-32) and Harry Truman (1945-1952) through Bill Clinton (1993-2000)
    • Official retrospective digitization project sponsored by the U.S. Government Printing Office
    • Initial page searches all volumes via Boolean logic
    • Other Searches includes Boolean and proximity searches for the author, title or citation
    • Browse by President and then use the title page or index to identify the pages you want to see
    • Pages available in image, pdf and text format
    • Although on-screen viewing is limited to page-by-page, you can add a volume to your bookbag and then download or email it to yourself

• Statements of Administration Policy on Appropriations and Non-Appropriations Bills
  • Brief statements of the President's position on selected bills beginning 2001
  • Arranged by Congress and bill number

• Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, 1993+
  • Full text of Presidential executive orders, speeches, press conferences, names of nominees
  • Phrases should be in parentheses and Boolean operators capitalized (e.g. "affirmative action" AND "college admissions")
  • Table of contents search (contents AND "july 28, 1997)

Bill Signing Statements

• American Presidency Project
  • Indexes and lists all bill signing statements since 1929

Presidential Decisions and Directives

• Definition
  • Presidential Directives given different names by different Presidents:

• Digital National Security Archive Presidential Directives
  • Full text of available presidential and national security directives, Truman through Clinton
  • Some of the Truman through Reagan material has been excised due to classification; most of the George Bush Sr. and Clinton materials are still classified as of September 2001
  • Searchable by keyword, date, author, and date

• Presidential Decisions and Directives (Federation of American Scientists)
  • List of national security directives since President Truman
  • Full text of everything that has been declassified
• Presidential Directives and Where to Find Them (Library of Congress)
  • Most are not published

Presidential Executive Orders

• Presidential Executive Orders, 1993 to present
  • Executive Order Disposition Tables, 1937+ (NARA)
    • Lists Executive Orders since Franklin D. Roosevelt's E.O. 7532, Jan. 8, 1937
    • Provides subject, date signed, location in Federal Register
    • Disposition includes link to orders which amended it
    • Does not provide the full text; identification tool only
  • Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, 1993+
    • Search under the term "Executive Order" and either subject or date in quotation marks

• Presidential Executive Orders, Pre-1993
  • Code of Federal Regulations, Title 3
    • Annual compilation of Executive Orders and Proclamations
    • JK 416 .A5 1949 Title 3 [year] with latest edition in the Documents Center--Ref.
  • Presidential Executive Orders and Proclamations, 1789-1983
    • Index: Doc.Cen. KF 70 .A5511--Ref.
    • Corresponding microfiche also located in the Documents Center
  • Executive Order Disposition Tables, 1937+ (NARA)
    • Lists Executive Orders since Franklin D. Roosevelt's E.O. 7532, Jan. 8, 1937
    • Provides subject, date signed, location in Federal Register
    • Disposition includes link to orders which amended it
    • Does not provide the full text; identification tool only
  • Table of Congressional Volumes and Presidential Issuances: 1789-1999 (LLSDC - pdf)
    • Lists Congress, year, and first number of both Presidential Executive Orders and Proclamations with the name of the President
  • John F. Kennedy Executive Orders
    • Text of 214 Executive Orders issued 1961-63
    • Access by number, date, title, and keyword searching
    • Scanned by Maria Schieda for University of Michigan School of Information and the Documents Center web site
  • Intelligence Documents (Federation of American Scientists) is the best on-line listing of Executive Orders related to intelligence activities

Rankings of U.S. Presidents

• Historical Rankings of U.S. Presidents
  • Results of several public opinion polls on the best and worst U.S. presidents

Salary

• Presidential and Vice Presidential Salaries, 1789+
  • Salaries and expensive accounts of President and Vice President
  • Excludes other perquisites
  • Extracted from Congressional Quarterly's Guide to the Presidency
• Former Presidents: Federal Pension and Retirment Benefits
  • Includes those who resign and are removed via impeachment
  • Congressional Research Service report, April 2005

Tax Returns

• Photocopies of tax returns for Franklin Roosevelt, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George Bush, and Bill Clinton while in office

Statements of Administration Policy

• Statements of Administration Policy (OMB), 2001+
  • Statements sent to the House or Senate regarding the Administration's policy on specific bills
  • May be as short as a paragraph or several pages long
  • Includes intended vetoes

• Clinton Era
  • 105th Congress, 1st Session, 1997
  • 105th Congress, 2d session, 1998
  • 106th Congress, 1st session, 1999
  • 106th Congress, 2d session, 2000

Vetoes

• Presidential Vetoes, 1789-1988
  • Provides retrospective access to vetoes, bill numbers, and final results by President
• Bill Vetoes
  • Available via GPO Access beginning 1995
    • Check off the boxes for "House Documents" and use "veto" as a keyword search
  • Also available on THOMAS under Bill Summary and Status, 1973+
    • Arranged by Congress
    • Vetoes searchable as a stage in the legislative process or in a separate list
• Line Item Vetoes
  • These are officially entitled Presidential Cancellations
  • Used in 1997 but not longer Constitutional

Presidential Speeches (Historical)

• American Presidency Project (UCSB)
  • Public Papers of the Presidents, 1929-1992
  • Complete run of State of the Union and Inaugural Addresses, 1789-present
  • Roosevelt Fireside Chats, 1933-44
  • National Party Platforms, 1840 to present
  • Additional materials only available to UCSB students

• Inaugural Addresses of the Presidents (Columbia University)
  • Full text of inaugural addresses beginning with George Washington

• President George W. Bush
  • President's Inaugural Address (January 20, 2005)
  • Inaugural Address (January 20, 2001)
  • State of the Union Address (January 29, 2002)
  • State of the Union Address (January 28, 2003)

• President Clinton
  • Inaugural Addresses
    • First Inaugural Address, January 21, 1993
    • Second Inaugural Address, January 20, 1997
  • State of the Union
    • State of the Union, February 23, 1993
    • State of the Union, January 25, 1994
    • State of the Union, January 24, 1995
    • State of the Union, January 23, 1996
    • State of the Union, February 4, 1997
    • State of the Union, January 27, 1998
    • State of the Union, January 25, 1999
    • State of the Union, January 27, 2000
  • Washington Post provides alternative indexed source

• Presidential Addresses
  • Inaugural, farewell, and State of the Union addresses, 1789-1995

• Commission on Presidential Debates
  • Text of the 2004 debates as they occur
  • Text of presidential and vice presidential debates beginning 1960 and every four years afterwards

• Public Papers of the President, 1993+ (GPO)
  • Presidential speeches and statements issued by the Office of the Press Secretary on an annual basis
  • Declarations, nominations, and executive orders
  • Browsable and searchable
  • Updated by Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, 1993+
  • The paper edition (Graduate Library Stacks J 80. A25) covers 1929-32 (Hoover) and 1945+ (Truman+)
  • The Documents Center also has presidential papers, 1789-1993, on CD-ROM (Do106)
  • Richardson's Compilation of the messages and papers of the presidents, 1789-1897 is located in Buhr as: J 81 .B96 and online through Project Gutenberg; The Abridgement (J 81 .83) includes summaries of executive department annual reports, 1858-1920

Presidential Succession

• Constitution, Article I, Section I, Clause 6
  • 20th Amendment (1933)
  • 25th Amendment (1967)
• Law of Presidential Succession (1947 as amended)
  • Law appears in Title 3, Section 19, of the United States Code
  • Outlines succession after the vice president

White House [Current]

• Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, 1993+
  • Full text of Presidential executive orders, speeches, press conferences, names of nominees
  • Phrases should be in parentheses and Boolean operators capitalized (e.g. "affirmative action" AND "college admissions")
  • Table of contents search (contents AND "july 28, 1997)

• White House and President's Park; Comprehensive Plan (NPS)
  • Twenty-year plan to upgrade the White House and create a visitor center
  • Plan released on December 2, 1998

• White House Web Site - Current
  • White House tours, information about First Family
  • Key Presidential documents documents
  • Individual Pages
    • President George Walker Bush
    • Laura Welch Bush
    • Vice President Richard Bruce Cheney
    • Lynne V. Cheney

• White House Web Site (Clinton)
  • Five versions of the White House web site and one version of White House electronic publications
  • Searchable as a whole; browsable and searchable individually
  • Link to the Clinton Presidential Center includes plans for a physical facility

• White House Staff List
  • List of White House staff and their salaries, 2003

Presidential Libraries and Archival Materials

• Presidential Libraries (Ibiblio)
  • Links to Presidential Libraries, Hoover to Bush
  • Includes National Archives description of holdings
    
  • Alternative National Archives Listing

• James Madison Papers
  • Especially rich for notes on the Continental Congress and Constitutional Convention
  • Over 72,000 digitized materials from the Library of Congress

• Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum and Library 1861-1865
  • Library to open in 2004
  • Web site features articles on misquotes of Lincoln
  • Architectural plans, chronologies, related web links on Lincoln

• Hoover Presidential Library, 1929-1932
  • Description of holdings, covering 1895-1932
  • As of September 2000, no documents are digitized

• Roosevelt Presidential Library, 1933-1945
  • Approximately 10,000 on-line files of German and Vatican diplomatic documents

• Truman Presidential Library, 1945-52
  • Extensive library of digitized, de-classified documents, 1945-52
  • Subjects: integration of the armed forces, decision to drop the bomb on Hiroshima, Marshall Plan, recognition of Israel, Truman Doctrine, Berlin Airlift
  • Includes the full text of the Truman Diary from 1947

• Eisenhower Presidential Library, 1953-1960
  • Digitized material includes World War II, Sputnik, the U-2 Spy Plane (Francis Gary Powers), and the International Geophysical Year

• Kennedy Presidential Library, 1961-63
  • Sound recordings and speeches
  • National Security Action Memoranda, including those on Cuba and Berlin
  • Link to Kennedy-Khrushchev exchanges from the State Department

• Johnson Presidential Library, 1963-1968
  • Telephone conversations and extensive oral histories available on the web
  • Fifty Presidential daily diaries, including November 22, 1963
  • Listing of archival material on foreign relations topics but none is digitized

• Nixon Collection - National Archives
  • Official location for the Watergate tapes
  • Includes audio and visual materials as well as textual documents from the administration
  • Various finding aids

• Nixon Foundation, 1969-74
  • Serves as a Presidential museum and library
  • Excerpts of taped conversations on the overthrow of Vietnamese President Diem in 1962, the CIA, and Watergate in Word 97
  • Transcripts of additional Nixon letters and memoes

• Ford Presidential Library, 1974-76
  • National Security Decisions and Memoranda in full text
  • Most of the National Security Council minutes held during the period
  • Selected documents on the Vietnam War, 1972-76

• Carter Presidential Library, 1977-1980
  • Full text of daily presidential diaries, arranged by day
  • Includes Middle East negotiations and the Iran hostage crisis
  • As of September 2000, most documents have not been digitized
  • Web site includes directions for searching non-digitized archival material through the National Archives main data base

• Reagan Presidential Library, 1981-88
  • Biographies and audio-visual materials
  • Finding aids to the audio-visual and textual collection
  • Public Papers, 1981-88, is being digitized; 1981-July 1983 completed as of September 2000

• Bush Presidential Library, 1989-1992
  • Full text of Public Papers of the President, 1989-92, including reaction to fall of Soviet Union and Gulf War
  • Listing of National Security Directives, 1989-1992
  • Some of the National Security Reviews are available in Adobe Acrobat format
  • As of September 2000, most publications have not been declassified for national security reasons

• Clinton Presidential Materials Project, 1993-2000
  • Four versions of the White House web site through Dec. 30, 2000
• Clinton Presidential Center
  • Onliine text of Presidential speeches, fact sheets, appointments, Executive orders
  • Dedication plans for November 18, 2004

Presidential Medal of Freedom

• Presidential Medal of Freedom
  • Lists recipients and their achievements,1945-
  • Numerous pictures and a history of the medal

Presidential Pardons

• Office of the Pardon Attorney (USDOJ)
  • Clemency standards, regulations, and application forms
  • Presidential clemency statistics since 1900 by administration, including applications and dispositions by year and administration
  • Names of pardon and clemency recipients for the Bush-41 and Clinton administrations
  • Maintains historic application files which can be requested under the Freedom of Information Act

• Presidential Pardons (Jurist)
  • History and legal basis of Presidential pardons with statistics on the number of pardons granted, 1789 to present
  • Primary documents on the Clinton pardons
  • Full text of scholarly articles from the 1990s
  • Extensive bibliography of scholarly books on the pardon process

Presidential Politics

• Documents in the News
  • Identifies sources of news stories

• United States Politics
  • Elections, public opinion polls, periodicals, newsmagazines

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Grace York, Coordinator, Documents Center
Ashley Brown, Documents Assistant, September 2006 The University of Michigan Library
Graphics by Sherry Piontek and Barbara Perles

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