Official Code of Georgia Annotated

The Official Code of Georgia Annotated or OCGA is the compendium of all laws in the U.S. state of Georgia. Like other U.S. state codes, its legal interpretation is subject to the United States Constitution, the United States Code, the Code of Federal Regulations, and the state's constitution. It is to the state what the United States Code (U.S.C.) is to the federal government.

Official Code of Georgia Annotated
Cover of vol. 1 (2007 ed.)
EditorGeorgia Code Revision Commission
ISBN978-0-327-11074-3
OCLC8723145

An unusual feature of the OCGA is that, as stated in section 1-1-1, the privately prepared code annotations are officially merged into the official copy and are published under the authority of the state. The state held that it retained sole copyright in the code and that the authorized publisher held copyright to the annotations, though the laws of the state were the combination of the code and the annotations. Thus, the publisher would charge for reproductions of the OCGA, with a portion of the fee being returned to the state as a licensing fee. This longstanding feature goes back to the Code of 1872. In 2018, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals held that the OCGA is not copyrightable,[1] and the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that holding in April 2020.

History

The OCGA is the descendant of the first successfully enacted attempt in any English-speaking jurisdiction at a comprehensive codification of the substance of the common law, the Code of Georgia of 1861.[2] The enactment of the Code predated the enactment of civil codes in 1866 in Dakota Territory and 1872 in California based on the work of New York-based law reformer David Dudley Field II.[2] In 1889, Field expressly conceded that point in a written article; he credited his lack of awareness of the contemporaneous Georgia project "to the breaking out of the Civil War."[2]

Unlike the relatively race-neutral Field civil code, large portions of the original Code of Georgia were drafted by the pro-slavery Confederate lawyer Thomas Reade Rootes Cobb, so that the Code was shot through with Cobb's strong bias in favor of slavery and white supremacy. For example, as originally enacted, it contained a presumption that blacks were prima facie slaves until proven otherwise.[3] After the Civil War (in which Cobb died at the Battle of Fredericksburg), the Code had to be heavily revised in 1867 to eliminate portions that were obviously incompatible with the Thirteenth Amendment. The Code has been further revised and reenacted many times since.

Copyrightability
Main article: Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, Inc.

In 2013 the State of Georgia, specifically the Georgia Code Revision Commission, threatened to sue Carl Malamud for copyright infringement over the posting of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated on the website Public.Resource.Org.[4] In 2015, the State of Georgia filed a copyright infringement lawsuit in the U.S. District Court, Northern District of Georgia.[5] The State of Georgia claimed a copyright in the Code, and that Carl Malamud and Public.Resource.Org had violated that copyright. Public.Resource.Org claimed that since the state has chosen to make the Official Code of Georgia Annotated the official and authoritative code of the entire state, the Code should not be subject to copyright law, and should be freely available for all citizens to read and access. The Code also holds, in denoting the annotated code as the "official code," that authorship and copyright remains with the State and not with the publisher.

In October 2018, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit held that the Official Code of Georgia, Annotated, is not copyrightable.[1] The Code Revision Commission, established by the Georgia General Assembly,[6] appealed this decision to the United States Supreme Court. The Court heard the oral arguments on December 2, 2019.[7] The case, Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, Inc., decided the question:

Whether the government edicts doctrine extends to – and thus renders uncopyrightable – works that lack the force of law, such as the annotations in the Official Code of Georgia Annotated.[8]

In April 2020, the Supreme Court of the United States affirmed the appeals court ruling by holding that the code annotations were ineligible for copyright protection.[9]

Titles

The OCGA is divided into 53 titles.

  1. General Provisions
  2. Agriculture
  3. Alcoholic Beverages
  4. Animals
  5. Appeal and Error
  6. Aviation
  7. Banking and Finance
  8. Buildings and Housing
  9. Civil Practice
  10. Commerce and Trade
  11. Commercial Code
  12. Conservation and Natural Resources
  13. Contracts
  14. Corporations, Partnerships, and Associations
  15. Courts
  16. Crimes and Offenses
  17. Criminal Procedure
  18. Debtor and Creditor
  19. Domestic Relations
  20. Education
  21. Elections
  22. Eminent Domain
  23. Equity
  24. Evidence
  25. Fire Protection and Safety
  26. Food, Drugs, and Cosmetics
  27. Game and Fish
  28. General Assembly
  29. Guardian and Ward
  30. Handicapped Persons
  31. Health
  32. Highways, Bridges, and Ferries
  33. Insurance
  34. Labor and Industrial Relations
  35. Law Enforcement Officers and Agencies
  36. Local Government
  37. Mental Health
  38. Military, Emergency Management, and Veterans Affairs
  39. Minors
  40. Motor Vehicles and Traffic
  41. Nuisances
  42. Penal Institutions
  43. Professions and Businesses
  44. Property
  45. Public Officers and Employees
  46. Public Utilities and Public Transportation
  47. Retirement and Pensions
  48. Revenue and Taxation
  49. Social Services
  50. State Government
  51. Torts
  52. Waters of the State, Ports, and Watercraft
  53. Wills, Trusts, and Administration of Estates

See also

References
  1. Code Revision Commission, et al v. Public.Resource.Org, Inc. (11th Cir.).Text
  2. Smith, Marion (1930). "First Codification of the Substantive Common Law". Tulane Law Review. 4: 178–189.
  3. Andrew P. Morriss, "Georgia Code (1861)," in Slavery in the United States: A Social, Political, And Historical Encyclopedia, vol. 1, ed. Junius P. Rodriguez (Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO, 2007), 314-315.
  4. "Georgia Claims Its Annotated Laws Are Covered by Copyright, Threatens Carl Malamud for Publishing the Law"
  5. "Complaint" (PDF), Code Revision Commission et al. v. Public.Resource.Org, Inc. (Court Filing), N.D.G.A., vol. No. 1:15-cv-02594, no. Docket 1, Jul 21, 2015, retrieved Jul 25, 2017 – via Recap (PACER current docket viewPaid subscription required)
  6. Ga. Code Ann. § 28-9-2 (Lexis Advance through the 2019 Regular Session of the General Assembly and HB 276 and HB 444 of the 2020 Regular Session of the General Assembly).
  7. "Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org Inc". Scotusblog. Retrieved March 22, 2020.
  8. "Docket for 18-1150". www.supremecourt.gov. Retrieved 2019-06-26.
  9. Georgia v. Public.Resource.org, No. 18–1150 (slip op.) (U.S. Sup. Ct. April 27, 2020).

Further reading
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