Is the Supreme Court&#39;s in-house citation style manual publicly available? SCOTUS uses a distinct in-house citation style which, although it has a lot in common with the Bluebook, is not the same (differing in key places) and is as far as I know unique. Is the citation style manual used in house for SCOTUS publicly available? Either because the Court has published it, or via FOI requests? It is probably possible to reverse engineer the citation rules from the Opinions of the Court, but do we have the guide for it?
A version republishing the Reporter's style guide is available on SSRN and for purchase on Amazon. It was edited in 2016, purportedly based on a 2013 copy of the Court's private style guide that the editor (Jack Metzler) somehow obtained. The Court's internal style guide may have evolved since then.
Please Note: This was written before the title change of this question and may no longer be applicable According to the Harvard website: In Feist Publications, Inc. v. Rural Telephone Service Co. 499 US 340 (1991) the United States Supreme Court held that copyright does not extend to a mere compilation of facts. In this case, it was a telephone directory much the same as the one in ProCD v. Zeidenberg 86 F.3d 1447 (7th Cir. 1996). Furthermore, the Court also ruled that something more than simple "sweat of the brow" labor was required before copyright protection would ensue, with some modicum of authorial originality necessary. Accordingly, it was held in Feist that copyright did not extend to a telephone directory, no matter how laborious a task its compilation was. The decision in ProCD v. Zeidenberg 86 F. 3d 1447 (7th Cir. 1996) is highly significant, therefore, in that it permits copyright or quasi-copyright protection to be extended to non-copyrightable material through the use of contract. One would have to consider each meta tag independently. For example, the "description" tag could by copyrightable since it is written for more than just the 'facts', such as a subtle advert for the site that is more than an objective description. However the 'og:type' would not be copyrightable since it would just be considered a fact. Now, if you are using it on another website and sourcing it properly, you could probably use it under "Fair Use" Uses That Are Generally Fair Uses Subject to some general limitations discussed later in this article, the following types of uses are usually deemed fair uses: Criticism and comment -- for example, quoting or excerpting a work in a review or criticism for purposes of illustration or comment. News reporting -- for example, summarizing an address or article, with brief quotations, in a news report. Research and scholarship -- for example, quoting a short passage in a scholarly, scientific, or technical work for illustration or clarification of the author's observations. Nonprofit educational uses -- for example, photocopying of limited portions of written works by teachers for classroom use. Parody -- that is, a work that ridicules another, usually well-known, work by imitating it in a comic way. A copyright would exist on the image. One would have to know what license currently applies to the image to know for sure, however, the "Fair Use" to copyright would still apply. With Fair Use, the entity type that uses the image is important. There is much more leniency when a non-profit uses copyrighted information than when the information is used in commercial activity. (With, of course, more exceptions.)
In practice, common law courts turn to academic writing, either law review articles or legal treatises or the &quot;Restatements of Law&quot;, on a regular, but infrequent basis. These sources are not binding sources of legal authority but can shed persuasive light on the logic behind a legal rule or the course of action that has been taken in previous similar cases. In civil law countries (i.e. those not descended from the legal system of England), there are far fewer circumstances in which court precedents are sources of law. Much of the gap in credible sources for how ambiguities in the statutory law should be interpreted in these countries comes from academic writing. In a typical civil law country, a leading law professor has more impact on how the law is interpreted than senior appellate court judges. Again, academic writings are not binding legal authority, but in the absence of alternative sources for material interpreting statutes, they are very persuasive.
Under United States copyright law, according to the Copyright Office, 206.01 Edicts of government. Edicts of government, such as judicial opinions, administrative rulings, legislative enactments, public ordinances, and similar official legal documents are not copyrightable for reasons of public policy. This applies to such works whether they are Federal, State, or local as well as to those of foreign governments. Referencing laws is even clearer: copyright doesn't protect referring to something like "Section 830 of the Penal Code of the State of California." Note that this is assuming that they remain within the US, where copyright law is a federal issue. Other countries don't all have the edict of government rule. If a place were to legally secede and become their own country, they would cease to be bound by US copyright law. They would get to decide if it was legal for them to do it or not; this is just like how it works between the UK and US (the UK claims copyright on its laws, but US courts will not enforce that copyright because it's incompatible with US law). Treaties complicate things, but the Berne Convention allows the edict of government exception. That said, seceding from the US unilaterally is both legally and practically impossible; seceding from a state is likewise generally going to be legally and practically impossible without permission from the state. So, it all depends on the agreements made. EDIT: To specifically address the model codes issue, Veeck v. S. Bldg. Code Congress Int’l, 293 F.3d 791 (5th Cir. 2002) was a case specifically about what happens when model codes are adopted wholesale into law. The Fifth Circuit (after initially finding that the model codes were protected) reversed en banc, finding that a model code produced for the purpose of being incorporated into law, and which has been incorporated into law, and which is then reproduced as the law of the place that incorporated it into law, is not subject to copyright. Veeck may not apply to cases where the law merely references the model code, or where the thing in question was not made to be incorporated into law (e.g. state laws referencing the Red Book valuation of a car didn't make the Red Book public domain). If both of those are true, it probably doesn't apply; if one holds but not the other, it's unclear. However, if the actual municipal code directly contains the text of the model code, and you reprint it as the law of that municipality (rather than as the model code), there is no copyright in the law.
It is binding precedent for lower federal courts in the Ninth Circuit. They are required to follow it. It is persuasive precedent for the other circuits and for state courts. They may be persuaded by the reasoning and will consider the fact that the Ninth Circuit held as it did to be one factor in their decision-making, but they can make a different decision if they want to. Some courts are also more persuasive than others, although this is usually not explicitly acknowledged in written opinions. For example, state courts in the Ninth Circuit are likely to give more weight to a Ninth Circuit opinion than they are to give weight to a decision from another circuit. Cases from the Second Circuit are more likely to be persuasive than cases from other circuits, because of its reputation. Cases from the Southern District of New York are more likely to be persuasive than cases from most other non-local District Courts. There is also a personal reputation function that comes into play when looking at persuasive decisions. Some judges have a better reputation or a better reputation with a particular other judge, and their decisions may be considered more carefully. This is not explicit, but it means a good lawyer will mention the judge's name when a case in support of his position was decided by a well-regarded judge. Finally, the Ninth Circuit's holding would be persuasive precedent for the Supreme Court. You could write law review articles about this, but to dip one toe in: they may be persuaded by the reasoning and it matters to their function of providing unifying law, so especially during the process of applying for a writ of certiorari, they will care what different circuits have held on an issue and which circuits are going which way. But they are not bound by the circuit courts, and will overturn all of the circuits if they think that's the right decision. They did that a while ago with a statute about what it meant to use a firearm while committing a crime, for example.
Unless there is something special in Pakistani case law on this topic, it would pass the originality requirement. In my opinion, it is actually very well laid out, and it is clearly not just slapping a few tags on plain text. This article does not indicate any particularly high standards for originality in Pakistan.
In Bartnicki v. Vopper 532 U.S. 514, SCOTUS ruled in a manner applicable to this case. In that case they assumed (did not decide, but operated from that initial position) that the information was illegally obtained, respondent knew that, but did not play any role in obtaining the information. They say that In New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U. S. 713, this Court upheld the press' right to publish information of great public concern obtained from documents stolen by a third party and held that privacy concerns give way when balanced against the interest in publishing matters of public importance. One of the costs associated with participation in public affairs is an attendant loss of privacy. Florida Star v. B.J.F. 491 U. S. 524 in a similar vein cites a principle (from Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Co., 443 U. S. 97) that if a newspaper lawfully obtains truthful information about a matter of public significance, then state officials may not constitutionally punish publication of the information, absent a need to further a state interest of the highest order. In other words, this is a matter where any restriction would be subject to strict scrutiny. Similar results are found in Boehner v. McDermott 332 F. Supp.2d 149. However, in Peavy v. WFAA-TV Inc, the TV station had a more active role in violating the law, so they were not protected by the First Amendment. As for the initial source, it is said to be unknown (to NYT) where the documents came from, though they were verified by Jack Mitnick. There are federal laws that would prohibit government agents from disclosing a person's tax return, but there is no general law against disclosing a tax return. Without more information on the source, it is impossible to determine whether that act was legal.
How to refer to Supreme Court cases by just one name In general, subsequent references to a decision can be the first name in the caption of that case. As an example, you will notice that in the decision Rucho v. Common Cause, 139 S.Ct. 2484 (2019) the court makes an initial reference to Gill v. Whitford (at 2492), and thereafter most of the references to that decision are simply Gill (see, for instance, at 2498, 2501, 2507). Nate Elredge makes a good point in that there are exceptions. Where the general rule may result ambiguous, another main party in the caption would be mentioned. Using Nate's example of United States v. Nixon, the court's subsequent references to that case in Calley v. Callaway, 382 F.Supp. 650 (1974) is Nixon. There might be other, harder to find, instances where ambiguity persists. For instance, several unrelated decisions issued by the same court might involve the exact same parties. In those scenarios only the suffix (that is, the numbers following the caption) would distinguish among decisions.