p-adic Proofs of congruences for the Bernoulli numbers

Many of the classical theorems for the Bernoulli numbers, particularly those congruences needed in the study of irregular primes, follow easily from the existence of the (p ? 1)st roots of unity in the ring of p-adic integers. Proofs are given for the von Staudt-Clausen theorem, the theorem of J. C. Adams, the Friedmann-Tamarkine congruence, a theorem of Vandiver, special cases of the congruences of Voronoi, Kummer, and Carlitz, and the congruences of E. Lehmer.