Papers pertaining to organizations that Lawson was affiliated with professionally other than the Daily News including the Associated Press, Associated Newspapers, City News Bureau of Chicago, and the City Press Association of Chicago. The Associated Press materials contain correspondence between Lawson and his colleague Frank B. Noyes and trace the early development of the organization. Other records are made up largely of financial reports and minutes. There are several reports from the Chicago Commission on Race Relations written in part by Lawson who was a member of the Commission. These reports eventually made up the book The Negro in Chicago, a response to the race riots of 1919.