A. Enter the ConSource Archive. In order to navigate to the ConSource document collections, either click on the “Constitutional Index” or “ConSource Collections” on the main menu, or enter through the ConSource Archive via the main navigation bar at the top of the ConSource homepage.

B. Navigating the Constitutional Index. Select “Constitutional Index” in the sub-navigation bar. You will now see Articles I-VII of the United States Constitution. Above the source image on this page you will find a small arrow with the text “view next document in the series.” Clicking this arrow navigates to the Bill of Rights/Amendments I-X. A second click navigates to Amendments XI-XXVII.

C. Constitutional Cross-References. Below the source images is a list of constitutional clauses. Clicking the corresponding radio button will highlight the associated clause within the text of the Constitution. Clicking this highlighted text will navigate to a list of collections with the same clause identified within its text. Then clicking the collection will list the documents. Choose a document and click the same clause previously chosen and it will highlight the text connected to the clause.

B. Navigating the Advanced Search. Select “Advanced Search” in the sub-navigation bar. There, you can search for documents by using one or more of the following fields:

1. Search by clause of US Constitution. Choose one or more clauses by holding down the Control button, then click search at the bottom of the page. This will retrieve the documents that Constitutional Cross-Referencers have identified as connected to your chosen clauses. Constitutional Cross-Referencers suggest cross-references and constitutional scholars confirm these suggestions. Both suggested and confirmed cross-references are included in the Advanced Search. Deselect a topic or clause also by holding down Control.

3. Certified Documents and Source Images. This fuctionality is currently not accessible to users, but will be soon with the pending upgrade to ConSource 2.0. But as an introduction, if a user wants to retrieve only certified documents or only documents with source images or both, these boxes can limit a search of the Index of the US Constitution or of Document Category or be chosen by itself and retrieve every certified document or every source image. A certified document has met all ConSource certification requirements as specified below under “Document Details” help.

4. Select a Date Range. This too is not currently accessible to users, but will be soon with the pending upgrade to ConSource 2.0. To explain the future capability, the documents currently on ConSource are from the years 1787-1791. Selecting one or more of those years will allow the user to limit the search by date.

5. Keywords. If the user searches by keyword, the search can be limited to title, document summaries or content within the document. The boxes to the right allow the user to search in this manner. Choose Title, Overview or Document Body. For the broadest search, leave all boxes unchecked. Also note that searching by keyword will yield exact matches. If the user is interested in a constitutional topic generally and does not know what key words to search, using the Constitutional Index for We the Legal Community may produce better results.

6. Relevance Search with Google. The Advanced Search currently allows exact simple text searching, which does not recognize characters, including quotation marks, ampersands, asterisks, exclamation marks, and "and" or "or". Relevance and Boolean searching will be added shortly with the pending upgrade. To currently use these means of searching the ConSource library, use the Google search box at the top of the Advanced Search page.

ConSource Content Phases. The content housed on ConSource eventually will include all available source material related to the Constitution. To build this online repository, Constitutional Scholars, along with ConSource staff, have identified six phases.

A. Phase I - Includes sources for Article I-Amendment 10 from May 25, 1787-December 15, 1791. This Phase does not include commentary or contextual information.

B. Phase II - Includes sources for Article I-Amendment 10 produced before May 25, 1787. This Phase does not include commentary and contextual information.

F. Phase VI –Documents how the U.S. Constitution has influenced other Constitutions around the globe, on a Constitution by Constitution basis, and also more broadly the development and spread of constitutionalism.

Documents on ConSource. A document is a record that includes both a searchable transcription and a source image of the underlying original. ConSource obtains transcriptions from 1) published volumes called “documentary editions” approved by the National Historical Publications and Records Commission at the National Archives and Records Administration or the National Endowment for the Humanities that contain transcriptions of source materials and 2) from transcriptions created on ConSource by volunteers according to the standards of the NHPRC and NEH. If taken from a documentary edition, the transcription is cited at the top of every document. Any published editorial commentary is removed from the text to present only the raw transcription of the source material, including original typos and old English spellings. If no published NHPRC or NEH-approved transcription is available, ConSource will create it from the original. When different transcriptions from documentary editions are available for the same original document, the transcription from the documentary edition whose subject is the author of the original document will be posted with the original document (e.g., when posting a letter from George Washington to James Madison, the transcription published in “The Papers of George Washington” will take precedence over the transcription published in “The Papers of James Madison”). Other transcriptions may be included in the “document” via tabs.

Collection Identification before Certification. Before certification, ConSource staff or an advisor must add a document to a ConSource collection. The Academic Advisory Subcommittee—a body composed of educators inside the classroom, archivists, historians, attorneys, and documentary editors— will review the collections and the Executive Committee will approve them.

James Madison’s Notes of the Constitutional Convention- James Madison, often referred to as the Father of the Constitution, meticulously recorded the proceedings of what is now referred to as the Constitutional Convention. Set to start on May 14, 1787, many of the delegates did not arrive until May 25. The signing of the final document September 17marks the close of the Convention. Mr. Madison’s notes are divided into individual days on the site.

The Federalist Papers. At the close of the Constitutional Convention, the people of the states then had to ratify it. This collection is the series of essays published in several New York newspapers (and widely re-published across the country) to persuade New Yorkers to ratify. Penned under the name of PUBLIUS, multiple authors wrote the treaties including Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay. Modern numbering and historical numbering diverge at Federalist 23. Therefore, the transcription will read one number less than the modernized title after this point. ConSource provides the first digital collection of the original newspapers.

The Anti and Pro Federalist Papers. This is the first time the Anti and Pro-Federalists papers have been digitized. It is a collection of newspaper publications mostly originating from Philadelphia, Boston and New York where citizens either support or criticize the proposed Constitution. These arguments greatly influenced the movement to adopt a Bill of Rights.

State Ratification Debates. This collection comprises newspaper announcements and ratification convention journals in each of the following states: Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Virginia.

Bill of Rights Legislative History. Divided into three subsections, this collection’s records show Congress’ legislative discussion preceding adoption of the Bill of Rights. “Other Documents” contains correspondence between founders with content specifically related to the Bill of Rights discussion in Congress. “Bill of Rights Drafts and Votes” includes official proposed resolutions or amendments and vote records. Lastly, the Senate chose to keep debates closed, so no records exist, however, from the first day of discussion, the House of Representatives opened debates to the public and this collection includes documents published in newspapers with content specifically addressing the Bill of Rights debate in the House of Representatives.

A. Source Image. Certified source images are identified by large seals. To be certified, all source images on the site, regardless of their type (manuscript or printed material) must meet the following criteria at a basic level:

1. Images must be scanned 400+ DPI Archival TIFF image, 400+ DPI PDF with JPG compression to 50% quality and 200 pixel height JPG thumbnail image.

2. To guarantee authenticity and protect against forgeries, all source images must be housed at a publicly-accessible institution. On the document page, the JPG found in the upper-right is a smaller image of the first page of the manuscript or printed material. Clicking on the JPG will allow the user to access a page with JPG images of the additional pages and view them in an image viewer.

B. Image Viewer. The image viewer allows for closer investigation. Clicking the plus sign and then one click on the document body zooms the view, magnifying the writing of the manuscript. Clicking the minus sign zooms the view out. The user can also move the view finder laterally.

Print: To change the format of the document to a printer friendly format, click the printer icon beneath ConSource Tools in the top left corner.

E-mail: To email a document page to a friend, click the envelope icon beneath ConSource Tools in the top left corner

D. Find within the page. To search for a specific word or phrase within the document, simultaneously press the keys “ctrl” and “f.” Enter the desired phrase in the box that appears and press enter.