Everett M. Dirksen
Collection

Office and personal appointment books and office guest sign-in books.

4.0 linear shelf feet

Constituent casework, Illinois patronage, inter-office memoranda, and, notably, political and campaign files for Dirksen’s four Senate campaigns and his other political activities. Includes personal files of the office’s director, Harold E. Rainville.

99.0 linear shelf feet 

7 linear shelf feet

Created by Center staff, this file contains copies of articles about Dirksen, the Congressional Record index to his remarks, the New York Times Index of references to him, and the Reader’s Guide to Periodical Literature citations to Dirksen.

1 linear shelf foot 

Information regarding Mrs. Dirksen’s participation in various service and political organizations, letters of condolence upon Senator Dirksen’s death, notes and drafts for The Honorable Mr. Marigold.

2 linear shelf feet 

Bulk of films are Your Senator Reports, Dirksen’s weekly television broadcast. Also documentaries and miscellany. Selected films have been converted to videotape.

681 films 

Bank statements, canceled checks, invoices, and ledger pages for the most part dealing with political campaigns.

2.5 linear shelf feet 

In order to reply to constituents, the Dirksen office created a library of responses arranged alphabetically by subject within each year. Having these online will give viewers a quick snapshot of the legislative workload and, in a sense, Dirksen’s style of representation and constituent service. The folder numbers designate the folders of the Chicago Office File in which the originals are located.

Copies of bills introduced, co-sponsored, or amended by Dirksen and his voting records.

24 linear shelf feet 

ca. 1,500 items

From his first week in office in the House of Representatives through 1946, Congressman Everett Dirksen personally composed and typed weekly newsletters (while Congress was in session) to his constituents in central Illinois. Congressional Front, as it was called, covered the personalities, politics, and policies of Congress and the federal government.

More than 12,500 pages of outlines and texts, reference materials, and other documents collected by Dirksen and kept in a set of personal notebooks.

4 linear shelf feet 

1 linear shelf foot

[RESTRICTED]
Material related to applicants for federal jobs and judicial appointments. Closed to research.

4.5 linear shelf feet 

Scattered correspondence and information about Dirksen’s medical condition, memoir, and recordings.

2 linear shelf feet 

10 linear shelf feet

Correspondence and material related to Dirksen’s campaigns and political activities, including his participation in Republican National Conventions.

11 linear shelf feet 

The record of federally-funded projects (community projects, depressed areas, highways, and rivers and harbors) in Illinois and Dirksen’s involvement in them.

55.5 linear shelf feet 

Drafts and transcripts of speeches; selected remarks in Congress (The Center does not have a complete set of the Congressional Record featuring Dirksen speeches on the floor), radio and television interviews; Republican leadership press releases; weekly constituent newsletters; transcripts of “Your Senator Reports”; and, Dirksen’s newspaper column. Unfortunately, Dirksen rarely composed his remarks in advance; in many cases no record of them survives.

6.0 linear shelf feet 

The Joint Senate-House Republican Leadership Minutes and Statements series documents the meetings of Republican congressional leaders, 1961-1968. A second series pertains to the National Republican Senatorial Committee, 1949-1959, which Dirksen chaired, 1952-1954.

Joint Senate-House Republican Leadership Minutes, 1961-1968
The minutes of the Republican leadership during the presidential administrations of John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson. In their original state, each session’s minutes generally include attendance, brief summaries of topics discussed, and background “fact sheets” for statements at press conferences following the meetings. The digitized document presented here include only the formal minutes. The press conferences following the leadership meetings achieved fame as the “Ev and Charlie” and “Ev and Jerry” shows.

4.0 linear shelf feet 

Topically arranged reference file for legislation, selected constituent cases, speeches, and other matters. The bulk contains information concerning legislation between 1964 and 1969. Topics receiving relatively substantial attention include civil rights, foreign trade, Internal Revenue Code amendments, attempts to repeal Section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act, Dirksen’s prayer amendment and reapportionment amendment, and the activities of the Trading With the Enemy Act subcommittee.

41 linear shelf feet