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The federal government forcing a state to enforce a federal statute would definitely violate the 10th Amendment if the state has laws against that. I think most
by jimz 8y ago
The federal government forcing a state to enforce a federal statute would definitely violate the 10th Amendment if the state has laws against that. I think most states have building codes irrespective of copyright status.
However, the very scenario is covered generally by statute already. Regulations, even copyrighted ones adopted by an agency, must be publicly accessible to have the force of law. Freely accessible in most cases relate to having physical access to the text in some free way. This seems like something that can be solved very simply on the state level: just redefine publicly accessible to publicly accessible on the internet.
- imgabe 8y agoYou have to be very specific about "publicly accessible on the Internet". This has to mean in a searchable, interlinked, HTML format. What the NFPA[1] does with its codes is to make them "available" through this horrible Java reader applet that prevents you from printing, selecting, copying and pasting or doing anything except looking at one page at a time. Oh, and half the time it's broken, or you have an incompatible version of Java or some other nonsense. It's a mess. [1] National Fire Protection Association. They publish the National Electric Code (NEC) among others.
- Old_Thrashbarg 8y agoSomehow it's not surprising to hear the NFPA Java reader is often broken. There's a perverse incentive: the more broken it is, the more money they make selling the law in book form. And then when they get to court, they can just say they already provide free access.