Reference sources

Document Register

Online register of internal documents produced by the Council of the European Union, 1999 onwards. Covers minutes of meetings, preparatory legislative documents, agendas and other material. The Register is searchable by key word, subject, reference number and other criteria. Many of the documents are available in full; where this is not the case members of the public can apply for access via the Request a Document link at the bottom of the search page. The interface is available in all the EU languages, but not all the documents are in every language.

Register of Commission Documents

Online register of internal documents produced by the European Commission from 1 January 2001 onwards. The register is searchable by document reference, Commission department, title, document type and other criteria; key word searching is offered on a separate ‘Full text search’ tab. There is also browseable collection of minutes and agendas from Commission meetings. If a document is not available in full via the register, it is possible to submit a request for it. The Register is available in all the languages of the EU, but not all the documents are in every language.

Comitology Register

The Comitology Register monitors the procedure by which the European Commission makes implementing legislation with the help of committees of representatives from the member states. It can be used to track the progress of this legislation. The main register covers the period from April 2008 onwards, but there is a link to the ‘Old comitology register’ for information from 2003 to March 2008. There is a search facility for documents and another for committees.

Greek Law Digest: the Ultimate guide to Investing in Greece

Greek Law Digest (GLD) is an English-language guide to Greek law, an initiative of law publisher Nomiki Bibliothiki under the auspices of the government and various business organisations. Intended primarily for foreign investors and entrepreneurs, GLD consists of overview articles by Greek lawyers on different aspects of Greek law, business and finance. It also has a page of legal and business news. A Chinese version of the site is available.

Open Government Guide

Guide to law and policy regarding open government in each US state and in the District of Columbia. Covers the rights of citizens to access official information and attend official meetings. For each state, and for DC, there is a guide available in both html and pdf format. The Guide is the work of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, which is based in Washington, DC.

American Presidency Project

Online archive of US presidential documents, election documents and data, and audio visual material. Includes executive orders, proclamations, State of the Union addresses and messages, inaugural addresses, addresses to Congress, press conference material, veto messages, party convention addresses, election debates and other resources. The archive is hosted by the University of California, Santa Barbara, and covers the period from 1789 to the present.

Legislative Sourcebook

Compilation of research guides, reference sources and links on the subject of US legislative research, put together by the Law Librarians’ Society of Washington, DC. Covers legislative history, US government document citations, key publications and much more. Consists predominantly of federal resources, but state legislation is covered too.

Waterlex Legal Database

The Waterlex Legal Database brings together information about national and international water law, governance and policy. It is provided by Waterlex, an international NGO. The data is partly crowd-sourced and partly obtained from the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization and other official bodies. The database is searchable by key word and can be filtered by country, region and/or type of document. For many countries, extracts from legislation are available, with links to the full text on national websites.

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