The records are divided into two subseries: the Correspondence series and the Bills, Audits, Reports and Miscellaneous series. The Correspondence subseries (Subseries A; 1.625 cu. ft.) is arranged alphabetically within each year and chronologically within each letter of the alphabet. Consisting of correspondence, resolutions, petitions, announcements of meetings and invitations, the files reflect Thurmond's concentration on matters relating to state finances and taxation, education, highways and roads, agriculture and rural electrification. Much of the correspondence is from constituents concerning legislation, especially bills that Thurmond worked to pass, such as those dealing with a loyalty oath for teachers, compulsory school attendance, and truck, poultry and optometry standards. The correspondence also shows Thurmond's involvement in the Clark's Hill and Santee-Cooper projects; Thurmond was appointed to a committee to study the latter in 1933.

Edgefield County issues were also important, and the records show Thurmond and Mims directing or authorizing county record audits, highway construction and health and welfare agency development. The county's economic situation is detailed in Thurmond's work with New Deal agencies such as the Works Progress Administration, Public Works Administration, Emergency Conservation Work, Civil Works Administration, Civilian Conservation Corps, National Recovery Administration, Reconstruction Finance Corporation and the Emergency Relief Administration, and in his attempts to place tubercular, feeble-minded, or orphaned county residents in the appropriate state homes, such as the State Hospital, State Training School or the John de la Howe School.

Other topics of interest include liquor laws, interstate cooperation, social security ("old age pensions"), Winthrop and Clemson Colleges' building programs and trustee elections, the Senator H. Kemper Cooke scandal of 1934-1935, and appointments to judgeships and various state government positions.

Among the organizations and state agencies represented in the files are the State Highway Department (Chief Commissioner Ben M. Sawyer), State Rural Electrification Administration (Director J.T. Duckett), South Carolina Public Service Commission, Farmers' and Taxpayers' League (Presidents J.K. Breedin and Niels Christensen), Women's Council for the Common Good (President Jessie H. [Mrs. C. Fred] Laurence) and the South Carolina State Grange (Master D. B. Anderson).

Correspondents include U.S. Senators James F. Byrnes and E. D. Smith, and former Senator Cole Blease; U.S. Representatives Hampton P. Fulmer and John C. Taylor; Governors Ibra Charles Blackwood and Olin D. Johnston; State Senators Edgar A. Brown, James H. Hammond, Lanneau D. Lide, Henry R. Sims and John F. Williams; State Representatives Neville Bennett, Soloman Blatt, Arthur Lee Gaston and D.A.G. Ouzts; Chief Justice of the State Supreme Court Eugene Blease; Judge G. D. Billinger; State Railway Commissioner Sam Blease; Supervisor of Adult Schools of the State Department of Education Wil Lou Gray; State Forester H.A. Smith; James Pinckney Kinard and Shelton Phelps, Presidents of Winthrop College; J.C. Littlejohn, Business Manager and E.W. Sikes, President, Clemson College; lawyers Calhoun Mays, John McMahon and George Bell Timmerman; and businessmen W.W. Miller (Bank of Trenton) and James C. Self (Greenwood Cotton Mill).

The Bills, Audits, Reports and Miscellaneous subseries (Subseries B; .45 cu. ft., 1 volume) is arranged alphabetically by folder title and then chronologically within each folder. This subseries includes a number of bill files, which contain lists of bill sponsored and cosponsored by Thurmond and copies of those bills. Some of these lists have notations concerning the final action taken on the bills.

Also included in this subseries are audits for Edgefield County, 1935-1937; Thurmond's notes on his legislative activities, 1932-1934; a list of his accomplishments for Edgefield County, 1933-1937; and the 1934 application (1 volume: 44 pages, plus 248 pages of appendixes and an 8 page index) by the South Carolina Public Service Authority for a loan from the Federal Emergency Administration to build the Santee-Cooper Power and Navigation Project.