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Page Number: 23.0

2 

GEORGIA v. PUBLIC.RESOURCE.ORG, INC. 

THOMAS, J., dissenting 

Broadcasting Cos. v. Aereo, Inc., 573 U. S. 431, 463 (2014) 
(Scalia, J., dissenting), I respectfully dissent. 

I 
Like  the  majority,  I  begin  with  the  three  19th-century
precedents that the parties agree provide the foundation for 
the government edicts doctrine. 

In  Wheaton  v.  Peters,  8  Pet.  591  (1834),  the  Court  first 
regarded it as self-evident that judicial opinions cannot be
copyrighted either by the judges who signed them or by a
reporter  under  whose  auspices  they  are  published.    Con-
gress provided that, in return for a salary of $1,000, the Re-
porter  of  Decisions  for  this  Court  would  prepare  reports
consisting  of  judicial  opinions  and  additional  materials 
summarizing  the  cases. 
Id.,  at  614,  617  (argument).
Wheaton, one of this Court’s earliest Reporters, argued that 
he owned a copyright for the entirety of his reports.  He con-
tended that he had “acquired the right to the opinions by
judges’ gift” once they became a part of his volume.  Id., at 
614 (same).  The Court ultimately remanded on the ques-
tion  whether  Wheaton  had  complied  with  the  Copyright
Act’s procedural requirements.  Id., at 667–668.  In doing
so, it observed in dicta that “the court [was] unanimously of 
[the]  opinion,  that  no  reporter  has  or  can  have  any  copy-
right  in  the  written  opinions  delivered  by  this  court;  and
that the judges thereof cannot confer on any reporter any 
such right.”  Id., at 668. 

Fifty-four  years  later,  the  Court  returned  to  the  same 
subject, suggesting a doctrinal basis for the rule that judi-
cial opinions and certain closely related materials cannot be
copyrighted.  In Banks v. Manchester, 128 U. S. 244 (1888), 
the state-authorized publisher of the Ohio Supreme Court’s 
decisions,  Banks  &  Brothers,  sued  a  competing  publisher 
for copyright infringement.  The competing publisher repro-
duced  portions  from  Banks’  reports,  including  Ohio  Su-
preme Court decisions, statements of the cases, and syllabi,