Prior to 1895, no court decision had occasion to consider any claim of copyright on behalf of the Government itself.
[6] But other material prepared for State Governments by their employees, notably the headnotes, syllabi, annotations, etc.
provided that "No copyright shall subsist ... in any publication of the United States Government, or any reprint, in whole or in part, thereof".
[6] There appears to be no court decision before 1895 dealing directly with the question of whether the United States Government might obtain or hold copyright in material not within the public policy rule.
[6] Two cases before 1895 may also be noted with regard to the question of the rights of individual authors (or their successors) in material prepared for, or acquired by, the United States Government.
The provision in the Printing Act concerning copyright of government works was probably the result of the "Richardson Affair", which involved an effort in the late 1890s by Representative James D. Richardson (1843–1914) to privately copyright a government-published set of Presidential proclamations.
"[6] The committee report on the bill that became the Act of 1909 explains that the savings clause was inserted "for the reason that the Government often desires to make use in its publications of copyrighted material, with the consent of the owner of the copyright, and it has been regarded heretofore as necessary to pass a special act every time this was done, providing that such use by the Government should not be taken to give to anyone the right to use the copyrighted material found in the Government publication".
[8] Section 403 of the 1976 Act introduced a new provision concerning documents consisting preponderantly of one or more government works.
According to the House Report, this provision was aimed at a publishing practice that, while technically justified under the present law, has been the object of considerable criticism.
[9] "To make the notice meaningful rather than misleading", section 403 of the 1976 Act required that, when the copies consist "'preponderantly of one or more works of the United States Government', the copyright notice (if any) identify those parts of the work in which copyright is claimed.
A failure to meet this requirement would be treated as an omission of the notice", resulting, absent the application of some exception, in the loss of copyright protection.
[9][10] The Berne Convention Implementation Act of 1988 amended the law to make the use of a copyright notice optional on copies of works published on and after March 1, 1989 and also revised Section 403.
Unless provided otherwise by an Agency FAR Supplement, a contractor may assert claim to copyright in scientific and technical articles based on or containing data first produced in the performance of a contract and published in academic, technical or professional journals, symposia proceedings, or the like.
For instance, material produced by the United States Postal Service are typically subject to normal copyright.
[15] Most USPS materials, artwork, and design and all postage stamps as of January 1, 1978, or after are subject to copyright laws.
[16][17] National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), FY2020, granted civilian members of the faculty at twelve federal government institutions the authority to retain and own copyright of works produced in the course of employment for publication by a scholarly press or journal.
The United States Copyright Office considers "edicts of government", such as judicial opinions, administrative rulings, legislative enactments, public ordinances, and similar official legal documents, not copyrightable for reasons of public policy.