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CRIJ 3361: Writing and Research for Criminal Justice

Research for CRIJ 3361 and APA overview

Finding Govt. Documents in the library

  • Think about key terms, for example:
    • college, colleges, univerity, universities, campus, campuses, or
    • identity theft, or
    • binge drinking, alcohol abuse,
  • Search the library catalog, using key terms such as terrorism or college? alcohol or campus rape
  • To the right of your search results, click the link labeled add filter: Government Documents Dept.
  • Government Documents are either online, or on the library's second floor.
  • Carefully note the location: there are multiple options such as U.S. Documents Shelves or CDs or microfiche

Citing Government Documents

There are many different kinds of government documents: Senate and House hearings, reports, laws, court decisions etc. Each type is cited a bit differently. Here are examples of two of the most common kinds of documents in our catalog.

A report or informative document is cited much like a book. This example has an agency as the author. Agencies can be both author and publisher:

United Nations. (1991). Consequences of rapid population growth in developing countries. New York, NY: Taylor.

Government hearings are cited like this:

Hearings on the "Equal Rights" Amendment: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Constitutional Amendments of the Committee on the Judiciary, 91st Cong. 1 (1970).

The rules for citing government documents are on pages 216-224 of the 6th edition of the Publication manual of the American Psychological Association.

NOTE: in a document, references are double-spaced, with a hanging indent.

Government Documents Online

Many documents are now available only online. Here are some websites that can be searched for reports related to the class assignment.

U.S. Government Web Sites
Cornette Library's guide to finding U.S. government web sites.
Homeland Security
Federal agency with primary responsibility for preventing and responding to terrorism in the United States.
Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics
J 29.9/6: (Government Documents)
Reports various criminal justice statistics.
U.S. Department of Justice
Primary Federal criminal justice executive agency. See also the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Drug Enforcement Agency, and ATF Online.
Texas Web Sites
Cornette Library's guide to finding Texas government web sites.
Texas Department of Public Safety
Primary state law enforcement agency, includes State Troopers and Texas Rangers. See crime statistics, and conviction record information, including sex offenders.
Texas Department of Criminal Justice
Texas agency which operates state prisons, state jails, parole, and probation.