Supreme Court Holds That Section 401(a) of the Copyright Act Does Not Preclude the Exercise of Federal Jurisdiction Over Unregistered Copyrights

By Nate DeBaun

In a decision published on March 2, 2010 (Reed Elsevier v. Muchnick, No. 08-103), the United States Supreme Court held that authors of unregistered works should not be automatically dismissed from a class of plaintiffs (with the class including owners of copyright registrations) involved in a settlement over electronic publication of works without proper authorization of, and compensation to, the original authors. The Court held that Section 401(a) of the Copyright Act, which requires authors to apply for federal registration of their works with the United States Copyright Office in order to bring a federal copyright infringement claim, does not preclude a federal court from exercising jurisdiction over a proceeding involving a mixed class of plaintiffs. In essence, despite the precondition that a work be registered in order for an author to institute a suit for infringement in federal court, the federal courts are still allowed to exercise subject-matter jurisdiction over proceedings involving unregistered copyrights.

What remains unclear after the Court’s decision in Reed Elsevier, is whether or not Section 401(a) of the Copyright Act imposes a mandatory requirement that an author apply for federal registration of a work before a federal court will exercise jurisdiction over the matter. However, it appears that the precondition is still in force and, while failure to register a copyright may not preclude a federal court from exercising jurisdiction in a case involving an unregistered work, in order to enjoy the remedies available under the Copyright Act, an author will need to apply for registration. Reed Elsevier involved an exception to the general precondition because the class of plaintiffs involved authors of both registered and unregistered works. Unless the author of an unregistered work has some other avenue to bring a claim before the federal courts, the safest route to assure that federal remedies can be sought in a case of copyright infringement, is to apply for registration of a work with the United States Copyright Office.

Published: 03/2010