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 never copyrighted." Based on the acknowledged and incontestable analogy with legislative acts, Wheaton held unanimously that "the law" in the form of judicial opinions may not be copyrighted.

The same broad understanding of what constitutes "the law" for copyright purposes underlies the Court's later decision in Banks v. Manchester, 128 U.S. 244, 9 S.Ct. 36 (1888). The Court there denied a copyright to a court reporter in his printing of the opinions of the Ohio Supreme Court. The Court first noted that whatever work the judges perform in their official capacity cannot be regarded as authorship under the copyright law. As a question of "public policy," the Court stated that,

there has always been a judicial consensus, from the time of the decision in the case of