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Govinfo.gov: Searching

 

When thinking of keywords for a search it is important to think outside of the box; what specific terms are related to your topic, who does your topic affect, what are the official names of laws related to your topic, etc. 

Example 1: Obamacare is officially named The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which is important to keep in mind when searching for resources related to that topic. 

Example 2: When searching for resources related to drugs try to think of what specific drug(s) you are looking for (marijuana, opiods, etc.), what types of drugs (recreational or prescribed), who the drug(s) affects (families, individuals, etc.), different stances on drugs, which collection would contain the best resources, and any more specifics you can come up with to ensure you are getting the most relevant results.  

 

One of the Collection Management features govinfo has implemented is the use of metadata. Metadata can most basically be described as "data about data" and is used for field searching.

 Below is a link to the page on how their metadata is formatted to search by date and for specific collections, sudoc #s, government authors, etc. 

https://www.govinfo.gov/help/search-operators#field-operators

 

Boolean logic - use AND, OR, NOT (sometimes AND NOT) to connect two or more search terms:

  • AND finds all records with all of your search terms and narrows your search
  • OR finds all records with one or more of your search terms and broadens your search
  • NOT or AND NOT is used to exclude the following term and can help to focus a search where one term has different meanings or uses (e.g., Mexico NOT "New Mexico")

Truncation - the library catalog and most databases use special characters to make searching easier in certain situations. Check the help screens in the catalog or database you are using to see what the special characters are for that resource.

  • the asterisk * is often used to stand for mutliple endings on a word (singular, plural, etc.): vot*finds vote, voter, voters
  • wildcards are similar, but replace another character in a word: wom?n in the library catalog finds both woman and women

 

All links below will send you to an advanced search with bookmarked criteria. You will have to click search to view results. For all linked searches, the first result will include the law. 

 

  7 U.S.C. §1011(f) & 36 C.F.R. §261.4(b) make it a crime to say something so annoying to someone that it makes them hit you in a national forest.

 

  10 U.S.C. §2674(c)(3) & 32 C.F.R. §234.7(c) make it a federal crime to willfully make an unreasonable noise at the Pentagon.

 

  15 U.S.C. §330a & 330d make it a federal crime to attempt to change the weather without telling the Secretary of Commerce.

 

  18 U.S.C. §1865 & 36 C.F.R. §2.15(a)(4) make it a federal crime to let your pet make a noise that scares the wildlife in a national park.

 

  18 U.S.C. §1865 & 36 C.F.R. §7.96(b)(3) make it a federal crime to harass a golfer in any national park in Washington, DC.

 

  40 U.S.C. §8103(b)(4) makes it a federal crime to injure a government-owned lamp.

 

 

FreedomWorks, Jason Pye: 19 Ridiculous Federal Criminal Laws and Regulations