Page:Veeck v Southern Building Code Congress Intl.pdf/7

 Wheaton v. Peters, 8 Pet. 591, that no copyright could, under the statutes passed by Congress, be secured in the products of the labor done by judicial officers in the discharge of their judicial duties. The whole work done by the judges constitutes the authentic exposition and interpretation of the law, which, binding every citizen, is free for publication to all, whether it is a declaration of unwritten law, or an interpretation of a constitution or statute.

Banks, 128 U.S. at 253, 9 S.Ct. at 40. (emphasis added). At this point, Banks relied upon a decision of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, which stated,

[I]t needs no argument to show that justice requires that all should have free access to the opinions, and that it is against sound public policy to prevent this, or to suppress and keep from the earliest knowledge of the public the statutes, or the decisions and opinions of the Justices.

Nash v. Lathrop, 142 Mass. 29, 6 N.E. 559 (1886). The court in Nash further observed that a legislature likewise could not deny public access to statutes.

Banks represents a continuous understanding that "the law," whether articulated in judicial opinions or legislative acts or ordinances, is in the public domain and thus not amenable to