The Brooklyn Law School Library’s subscription to CQ Press Political Reference Suite of Online Editions combines a number of CQ’s government and political reference materials. Among the titles in the suite are:
- CQ Almanac (with analysis on politics and policy in Congress since 1945)
- The Supreme Court Yearbook (coverage of the Court updated yearly since 1989)
- Vital Statistics on American Politics 2010–2011 (complete, authoritative, data-rich resource on the full-spectrum of U.S. politics)
- Political Handbook of the World (the most authoritative resource for political information on more than 200 countries)
- Historic Documents Series (key documents and analysis-updated yearly since 1972)
- Washington Information Directory (essential guide to key contacts at government and nongovernmental organizations).
Users can search the whole Reference Suite or work with selected titles. The opening screen provides a single search box, Search Your Online Editions, as well as an advanced search link. Further down the page is the option to Browse Your Online Editions followed by a column of all the titles to which the library subscribes. Users can link to the Your Profile link to Log in/Create Your Account, Document History, Favorite Documents, and Saved Searches
A search for “Fiorello La Guardia” yielded 16 results ranging from Unions and Labor-Management Relations Legislation, Background, 1900-1945 in Congress and the Nation Online Edition to CQ Almanac and from Guide to U.S. Elections Online Edition to Encyclopedia of the First Amendment. The first document refers to the Norris–La Guardia Anti-Injunction Act of March 23, 1932; another is a state-by-state account of the 1914 House of Representatives elections, with candidate names, party affiliations, and the votes each received.
The Advanced Search permits searches of the entire database or of specific titles only, as well as queries that include only certain topics—Congress, The Courts, Elections, Executive and Federal Government. Users can limit by document type, such as case summary or election (an icon labels the type, and an explanation of each is available under User Resources), and by event date. An advanced search for “Fiorello La Guardia,” limiting results to biography, returned one result: an entry for Lloyd N. Cutler from the Encyclopedia of the First Amendment (Cutler’s father was one of the mayor’s law partners).
A review in the October 15, 2011 edition of the Library Journal used the search term “immunization refusal” and found the results were “right on target, ranging from information on public health programs to a mention of immunization programs in a state of the union address.” Users can change the display ranking by date, number of hits, type, or alphabetically by title or source. The type and quality of information includes legislative analyses, primary-source materials, encyclopedias, in-depth current issues and archival reports, biographies, maps, chronologies, images, case summaries, bibliographies, and more.
