Slashdot Mirror
Open Source Law
Russ Nelson writes "The U.S. Supreme Court just announced its refusal to review the 5th
Circuit's en banc decision that there can be no copyright of
privately authored laws offered to U.S. governmental bodies for adoption. The
model law itself may be copyrighted, but once it's adopted, the law
must be open source. The entire case is laid out on Peter Veeck's
page." Slashdot touched on this before, but never really covered this dispute in depth. Here's a nice legal summary of the case.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
The law is public domain. Use the correct term, desire for buzzword compliance notwithstanding.
sulli
RTFJ.
http://regionalweb.texoma.net/cr/VEEKbrief.html This may be a bit easier to read...
Kids these days. They don't know the difference between classic, and just plain old.
Just for your information, and without malice. You should have said "it sort of implies" - you would infer from what was implied... Infer means to make a conclusion.
In the Supreme Court of the United States
:
Southern Building Code Congress International, Inc, Petitioner
v.
Peter Veeck, D/B/A Regional Web
No. 02-355
Update June 3065, 2003
Summary
On June 27 the Supreme Supreme Court decided not to hear an appeal of the Fifth Circuit court June 7, 2002 decision in Veeck vs. SBCCI No. 99-40632 that when a copyrighted standard or code is referenced into law (particularly if it thereby becomes "the law"), the developer cannot enforce its copyright against a free distribution of the standard
June 27, 2003 02-355 SOUTHERN BUILDING CODE V. VEECK, PETER
The motion of respondent for leave to proceed in forma pauperis is granted. The petition for a writ of certiorari is denied.
This case is a matter of considerable concern to the Southern Building Code Congress International (SBBI) and to many other standards developers who depend upon the sales of their published and copyrighted standards to support their continued operation. On June 6 the Southern Building Code Congress International, Inc. (SBCCI) had filed a Supplemental Brief with the United States Supreme Court in response to a brief filed with the Supreme Court on May 30 by the Office of the Solicitor General.
The Solicitor General distills the essence of the dispute below:
Question Presented (to the Solicitor General) by the Supreme court on December 2, 2002 as discussed in the May 30 amicus
This case concerns model codes written and copyrighted by a private organization. The codes apply to the construction, alteration, use, occupancy, and maintenance of buildings and the electrical, plumbing, mechanical and gas systems in them and provided criminal misdemeanor penalties for failure to comply. The private organization offers the codes to government entities for enactment into law. Two municipalities enacted ordinances that adopted the model codes by reference. The question presented is: Whether copyright law gives the private organization the right to restrict individuals from making copies of the material incorporated by reference in the municipal codes of the two municipalities.
Peter Veeck provides free access to information about the rural areas of Texas north of Dallas, including the codes and ordinances of the cities of the area, Veeck filed suit in federal district court in Sherman, Texas, against the Southern Building Code Congress International (SBCCI) for a declaration that the SBCCI standard codes which are adopted by reference by the cities in the Texoma area are in the public domain and not subject to the copyright claimed by SBCCI. He filed suit in Texas after being threatened with suit by SBCCI which is located in Alabama. Amicus Curae by SDOs
On May 30, 2003 the Solicitor General of the United States Department of Justice essentially concluded that copyright law does not give a private organization the right to restrict individuals from making copies of the material incorporated by reference in the municipal codes of the two municipalities. The Solicitor General stated, "This case involves a comprehensive code specifically created for enactment into law and designed broadly to regulate the primary conduce of private parties, The court of appeals' holding that such a code may be copied by interested members of the public is correct, it is consistent with the views of the only other court of appeals to address the same issue and it does not conflict with any decision of any other court of appeals. There is a broad range of differing governmental uses of a wide variety of different types of privately copyrighted materials, In a few cases, the courts of appeals have addressed the issues arising form such uses; they have divide between those involving the incorporation of copyrighted codes into laws that directly regulate primary conduct and those involving laws that reference copyrighted materials. In future cases, the courts of appeals can be expected to develop the relevant dif
whatever lameness they used to code that page has been eliminated here:
:
In the Supreme Court of the United States
Southern Building Code Congress International, Inc, Petitioner
v.
Peter Veeck, D/B/A Regional Web
No. 02-355
Update June 3065, 2003
Summary
On June 27 the Supreme Supreme Court decided not to hear an appeal of the Fifth Circuit court June 7, 2002 decision in Veeck vs. SBCCI No. 99-40632 that when a copyrighted standard or code is referenced into law (particularly if it thereby becomes "the law"), the developer cannot enforce its copyright against a free distribution of the standard
June 27, 2003 02-355 SOUTHERN BUILDING CODE V. VEECK, PETER
The motion of respondent for leave to proceed in forma pauperis is granted. The petition for a writ of certiorari is denied.
This case is a matter of considerable concern to the Southern Building Code Congress International (SBBI) and to many other standards developers who depend upon the sales of their published and copyrighted standards to support their continued operation. On June 6 the Southern Building Code Congress International, Inc. (SBCCI) had filed a Supplemental Brief with the United States Supreme Court in response to a brief filed with the Supreme Court on May 30 by the Office of the Solicitor General.
The Solicitor General distills the essence of the dispute below:
Question Presented (to the Solicitor General) by the Supreme court on December 2, 2002 as discussed in the May 30 amicus
This case concerns model codes written and copyrighted by a private organization. The codes apply to the construction, alteration, use, occupancy, and maintenance of buildings and the electrical, plumbing, mechanical and gas systems in them and provided criminal misdemeanor penalties for failure to comply. The private organization offers the codes to government entities for enactment into law. Two municipalities enacted ordinances that adopted the model codes by reference. The question presented is: Whether copyright law gives the private organization the right to restrict individuals from making copies of the material incorporated by reference in the municipal codes of the two municipalities.
Peter Veeck provides free access to information about the rural areas of Texas north of Dallas, including the codes and ordinances of the cities of the area, Veeck filed suit in federal district court in Sherman, Texas, against the Southern Building Code Congress International (SBCCI) for a declaration that the SBCCI standard codes which are adopted by reference by the cities in the Texoma area are in the public domain and not subject to the copyright claimed by SBCCI. He filed suit in Texas after being threatened with suit by SBCCI which is located in Alabama. Amicus Curae by SDOs
On May 30, 2003 the Solicitor General of the United States Department of Justice essentially concluded that copyright law does not give a private organization the right to restrict individuals from making copies of the material incorporated by reference in the municipal codes of the two municipalities. The Solicitor General stated, "This case involves a comprehensive code specifically created for enactment into law and designed broadly to regulate the primary conduce of private parties, The court of appeals' holding that such a code may be copied by interested members of the public is correct, it is consistent with the views of the only other court of appeals to address the same issue and it does not conflict with any decision of any other court of appeals. There is a broad range of differing governmental uses of a wide variety of different types of privately copyrighted materials, In a few cases, the courts of appeals have addressed the issues arising form such uses; they have divide between those involving the incorporation of copyrighted codes into laws that directly regulate primary conduct and those involving laws that reference copyrighted materials. In
Well, it basically means that you can't go around making copies of the law itself. If you need a copy, you will have to order it from someone who is authorised to make copies, and you will presumably have to pay for it.
Traditionally, this has been the case for large codes such as building codes or electrical codes. These are law, and you can go down to your local branch of government (city hall, legislature, etc) and read the copy they have there, but you can't photocopy the whole thing and take it home with you.
If you were a construction company, or a law firm specialising in defending construction companies (or homeowners against construction companies,) then it would be in your best interest to purchase a copy of the local building codes. You wouldn't have to -- you could do all of your research at city hall -- but it would make good business sense.
These sorts of laws were allowed to be copyrighted in the past because they are generally drafted by large national engineering bodies, who tend to put a lot of work and resources into them. Charging for copies to the people who actually use them offsets much of that cost. It will be interesting to see how this decision affects things the next time the codes are up for review.
Living better through chemicals
Plain and simple you can't copyright fact and a law is fact. Hence "fact of law".
Have you ever been to a turkish prison?
105. Subject matter of copyright:
United States Government Copyright protection under this title is not available for any work of the United States Government, but the United States Government is not precluded from receiving and holding copyrights transferred to it by assignment, bequest, or otherwise. If public interest groups draft model laws that they want enacted, they should be prepared to lose any copyright in those model laws if, in fact, they get adopted. What the hell would they want to keep the copyright for, anyway? Other than cock-strocking.
I suppose, however, that applies only to US government works and not US State Government works. Just another reason why we don't need states, and they sure as hell shouldn't have any rights. When has "state's rights" ever been used as an argument for anything worthy and moral?
Stupid people make stupid things profitable.
Peter Veeck wrote a bunch of codes and standards for buildings and utilities. As best I can tell, he had them up on a Web site, available at no charge to anyone who wanted them. (Being available free like that does not affect his copyright - he would still own it.)
He then proposed these standards to some of the nearby towns as proposals for laws.
At least two of the cities took him up on it, and passed the codes into law in their municipalities.
SBCCI made a reference to the codes as being "public domain". Veeck objected to this.
As best I can determine, he was not trying to prevent anyone from accessing the information, he was just saying "This is my text, I wrote it, I have the copyright on it".
The court said, in effect, "Not after those cities turned it into law!".
There seem to be two key elements: First, Veeck offered his writeup of the codes to the towns to be made into law (i.e., they didn't steal it from him). Second, they incorporated it by reference, i.e. saying something to the effect of "The codes that Peter Veeck wrote up are now law." (I didn't dig deep enough to see whether that was his idea or theirs.)
All laws are public domain (having to pay a fee to see a law that you are bound by might start another revolution...). What the court said here is that by that specific code (the one he wrote and (I think) had on his web site) becoming law, the "public domainness" of law overrode his (ordinarily perfectly good) copyright, so SBCCI is right, and what he wrote is now in the public domain.
Actually, you have it reversed. Peter Veeck did not write the codes. He published the codes that SBCCI wrote.
SBCCI threatened to sue him for publishing the codes. Peter Veeck sued first for a declaratory judgment in a Texas federal court. He probably did this to eliminate the risk that they would drag him to federal court in Alabama (their location).
Bravo! [serious]
On top of what you propose, there should also be a way for citizens to comment on law as it develops, using an online markup system and comment area. See the "Asynchronous Collaborative Structured Document Building & Review" links under Real-world Applications at http://www.democracy2.org/?section=library&tab=enh ancing for possible tools (albeit with some enhancements) that could be utilized.
Steve Magruder, Metro Foodist