Under the Act, works of the U.S. government—any work prepared by an officer or employee of the federal government as part of his or her official duties—may not be copyrighted.[1] Although this appears straightforward, there are some possible twists, such as works prepared for the government under contract, and copyrighted works included in government publications.
Whether a work prepared by an independent contractor under a federal contract or grant is copyrightable generally depends on the terms of the contract between the government and the contractor. The status also may be governed by legislation or agency regulations.[2] Therefore, even though a work prepared by the RAND Corporation under a government contract may have been funded with taxpayer dollars (which one might think should place it in the public domain), it may be protected by copyright if the contract or a federal statute or regulation so provides.
A copyrighted work does not lose its copyright status just because it is included in a work of the U.S. government. For example, a senator wants to include in the Congressional Record a copyrighted poem written by one of his constituents. As a work of the federal government, the Record is not protected by copyright. However, the poem does not lose its copyright protection because it is reprinted in the Record.
Conversely, a non-copyrightable governmental work that is reprinted by a private publisher, or a portion of a governmental work included in a privately created work, does not lose its public domain status.[3] For example,
- A publisher who reprints all of the federal statutes dealing with public education cannot claim copyright in the text of the laws.
- A publisher who reprints a report by the U.S. Surgeon General cannot claim copyright in the text of the report.
- A publisher who includes in its newsletter proposed and enacted federal regulations from the Federal Register and the Code of Federal Regulations cannot claim copyright in the text of the regulations.
