Research Guides: Latina/o Studies 420: Government/Public/Legal

Census Information

U.S. Census Bureau Data Explorer
U.S. Historical Census Data (IPUMS NHGIS)
The National Historical Geographic Information System (NHGIS) provides easy access to summary tables and time series of population, housing, agriculture, and economic data, along with GIS-compatible boundary files, for years from 1790 through the present and for all levels of U.S. census geography, including states, counties, tracts, and blocks.
Census of Agriculture Historical Archive (USDA)
This site serves as a public archive of U.S. Census of Agriculture publications published prior to 2007.

Using Census Data

Note on finding and using Census Data: Due to changing methods and questions, historical data for the U.S. Census can be more difficult to find and use than current data. The links below may offer some assistance. However, if you are having difficulty, please don't hesitate to ask for help!

Polls and Public Opinion

Roper Public Opinion Archives This link opens in a new window
Contains public opinion data, including polls from Gallup, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News, General Social Surveys and many other major polling organizations.

Pew Research Center
Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world.

ICPSR This link opens in a new window
One of the best places to start looking for a data set. Provides access to archived social science data for research and teaching. Maintained by the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research at University of Michigan.

Government/Legal/Policy

United Nations - Official Document System
The Official Document System (ODS) is an online database of UN documents. ODS has full-text, born-digital UN documents published from 1993 onward, including documents of the Security Council, the General Assembly, the Economic and Social Council and their subsidiaries, as well as administrative issuances and other documents. ODS is maintained by the Office of Information and Communications Technology (OICT).

Congressional Publications This link opens in a new window
Publication Dates: 1789-Present
Provides U.S. congressional documents covering the full legislative process. Includes congressional debates (the Congressional Record), bills, laws, hearings, committee prints, and reports.
HeinOnline This link opens in a new window
Provides the full text of law reviews, Congressional and treaty documents, and U.S. legal material from the 18th century to the present.

MuckRock
MuckRock is a non-profit, collaborative news site that brings together journalists, researchers, activists, and regular citizens to request, analyze, and share government documents, making politics more transparent and democracies more informed. The site provides a repository of hundreds of thousands of pages of original government materials, information on how to file requests, and tools to make the requesting process easier, as well as original investigative reporting and analysis.