Library of Congress Manuscript Division

The Manuscript Division seeks to acquire, preserve, and make available for research use personal papers and organizational records documenting the scope and diversity of the American experience. With more than twelve thousand collections and over seventy-three million items, the collections touch upon nearly every aspect of American history and culture. The Manuscript Division's holdings are strongest in American national government, federal judiciary, diplomacy, military history, American literature, women's history, Black history, history of science, and history of the Library of Congress.

Popular collections include the personal papers of twenty-three U.S. presidents, including George Washington and Abraham Lincoln; nine hundred congressional collections, including Daniel Webster, Robert M. La Follette, and Patsy T. Mink; more than three dozen Supreme Court justices from John Jay to Thurgood Marshall to Ruth Bader Ginsburg; the papers of civil rights leaders such as Frederick Douglass, Rosa Parks, and Frank Kameny; and the records of civil rights organizations ranging from the National American Woman Suffrage Organization to the NAACP. Other notable collections include the papers of scientists J. Robert Oppenheimer and Vera C. Rubin; writings and correspondence of authors Ralph Ellison and Shirley Jackson, and poets Walt Whitman and Edna St. Vincent Millay, and journalists Horace Greeley and Daniel Schorr; and the Library of Congress Archives.

The Manuscript Reading Room provides access to these and many other paper, microform, and digital collection materials. Reference staff provide in-person and remote access to collection materials, answer reference questions, and help secure the collections of the Manuscript Division.