Register of Copyrights

The Register of Copyrights is the director of the United States Copyright Office within the Library of Congress, as provided by usc|17|701. The Office has been headed by a Register since 1897; as of 2008, the current Register is Marybeth Peters, the eleventh appointed Register and the fourteenth individual to serve in this position. The Register is appointed by, and responsible to, the Librarian of Congress.

Although the title suggests a clerical role, Registers of Copyrights have been responsible for creating the procedures and practices of the Copyright Office and establishing standards for registration of copyright. They have increasingly been responsible for setting or influencing United States copyright policy. Today the Register is responsible for administering rulemaking procedures and producing authoritative interpretations of some aspects of U.S. copyright law, as well as advising the Librarian of Congress on the triennial proceeding on exceptions to the anticircumvention rules of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The Register also routinely testifies before Congress on copyright policy matters.

The Register's statutory title is "Register", not the more familiar "Registrar". (Today the English sense of "Register" often refers to a document, but there is a dictionary sense referring to a person.)

List of Registers of Copyrights

* Marybeth Peters, 1994—present
* Barbara Ringer, (acting) 1993—1994
* Ralph Oman, 1985—1993
* Donald Curran, (acting) 1985
* David Ladd, 1980—1985
* Barbara Ringer, 1973—1980
* Abe A. Goldman, (acting) 1973
* George D. Cary, 1971—1973
* Abraham L. Kaminstein, 1960—1971
* Arthur Fisher, 1951—1960
* Sam Bass Warner, 1945—1951
* Richard Crosby De Wolf, (acting) 1944—1945
* Clement Lincoln Bouvé, 1936—1943
* William Lincoln Brown, 1934—1936
* Thorvald Solberg, 1897—1930

References

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* United States Code. usc|17|701.