U.S. Congressional Serial Set

CITATIONS THAT GUIDE YOU TO SERIAL SET INFORMATION CAN BE CONFUSING IF YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND THE PROCESS:

I.  A committee meets and writes a report.  The Government Publishing Office prints and sends these findings to libraries.

II.  Reports/documents are organized with a SuDoc number. (Y 1.1/#:#-#)

The number following the slash tells us if the item came from the House or Senate, and whether it is a document or a report.  The number after the colon is the Congress when the information was discussed and a number assigned to that document. For instance in the picture on the left, the 107 is the 107th Congress and the number 334 is the number of that House report.                     (Y 1.1/8:107-334)

Sudoc stems used for Senate and House items follow:

Y 1.1/3:#  Senate Documents

Y 1.1/4:#  Senate Treaty Documents

Y 1.1/5:#  Senate Reports

Y 1.1/6:#  Senate Executive reports

Y 1.1/7:#  House Documents

Y 1.1/8:#  House Reports

III.  The Congressional session ends.

IV.   One or several reports/ documents are compiled numerically into a volume and assigned a new stem:   Y 1.1/2:#.

The volume number follows the colon.  This is also the Serial Set number.  This number always appears on the spine of the printed volume.  Since the Serial Set covers so many topics and years, The Schedule of Serial Set Volumes  was developed as an index to help.  It can be found in paper in the Document Reference area or online at the FDLP website.  Ask the Documents librarian or staff to help you convert a report number to a Serial Set number.  Once a number is found, you can find the corresponding volume in the Documents room,  Some databases, such as Proquest Congressional, will convert the number as you search and supply a digital copy of the information.  

          Y 1.1/2:14687b