Below you will find a link to Section 13. Copyright Protects Expression of the Copyright Restatement. The project as a whole was approved by ALI membership at the 2025 Annual Meeting; Section 13 appeared in Tentative Draft No. 2, which was approved by the ALI membership at the 2021 Annual Meeting.
In order to fully understand a Restatement, you must first understand the process that ALI follows, as well as the content of our work. Please find below a very short review, with more detailed information available on the ALI website FAQ page.
Who works on the Restatements?
There are three key groups of people working on ALI projects: Reporters, Advisers, and Members Consultative Group (MCG) participants. Each plays a unique and critical role throughout the life-cycle of a project. Because of the nature of some of ALI’s projects, additional project participant types may be invited, such as Liaisons from relevant organizations. Together, these project participants make a commitment to review the drafts and provide input to Reporters.
Reporters structure the project, prepare drafts, and present drafts to Advisers and MCG participants for discussion. After receiving feedback and direction on the drafts from Advisers and MCG participants, the Reporters then incorporate this feedback into the next draft. Reporters are explicitly not called “authors” by ALI because they merely “report” to the Institute by means of a series of drafts. The Reporters then continually revise drafts in response to the feedback offered by Advisers, MCG participants, and the Council. Thus, oftentimes no participant—even our Reporters—walks away from the process fully in agreement with every section of the publication. But ALI’s deliberative process ensures that every issue receives a full airing of viewpoints and that the final product will represent the considered scholarship, experience, and judgment of the ALI as a whole.
ALI enlists a group of Advisers or other related roles (Liaisons, etc.) for each project. This diverse group of subject matter experts makes a commitment to review the drafts and provide input to Reporters. Advisers are recommended to ALI’s Council by the Reporter(s), Director, and Deputy Director. Advisers are selected to be a balanced group that can provide expertise from a broad range of perspectives. For example, on the recently completed Principles of the Law, Election Administration, the advisory group included individuals closely associated with both the Republican and Democratic parties.
Each project includes an MCG made up of ALI members who volunteer to join project discussions at any stage of a project’s life-cycle. MCG members are not necessarily experts in the project’s area of law, but provide a vital perspective, as they read the drafts from a generalist’s point of view. MCG participants may provide input by attending project meetings and by submitting written comments. Even ALI members who do not join the MCG are encouraged to provide their thoughts on project drafts. They too may share their input by attending the Annual Meeting session or by submitting written comments.
ALI is a bicameral body: Institute drafts, and sections of the drafts, are not considered the position of ALI until approved by both the ALI Council and ALI membership. Both bodies give approval by voting (by Council at a Council meeting; by membership at an Annual Meeting). Through this process, the text of a project section may change drastically from an early draft to Tentative Draft approved at an Annual Meeting.
What is inside a Restatement?
A Restatement assumes the perspective of a common-law court, attentive to and respectful of precedent, but not bound by precedent that is inappropriate or inconsistent with the law as a whole. Restatements present each topic using three main components.
Black Letter
A black-letter provision normally consists of a single rule, principle, or statement of law or of an integrally related series of rules, principles, or statements. Black letter is easily identified in the publications as it appears in bold, black type.
Comments
The Comments appended to an ALI black-letter provision are mainly explanatory. Along with the black letter, Comments are an integral part of the Section to which they belong. Readers consult the Comments in order more fully to understand the background and rationale of the black letter and the details of its application.
Illustrations
Illustrations are distinct but integral parts of the Comment. They are inserted into the Comment for the purpose of providing concrete, “real world” examples of how the black-letter rule or principle under discussion applies to specific factual situations.
Reporters’ Notes
Reporters’ Notes set forth and discuss the legal and other sources relied upon by the Reporter(s) in formulating the black letter and Comment and enable the reader better to evaluate these formulations; they also provide avenues for additional research. Reporters’ Notes often contain many citations to court cases, which can aid in additional research on any topic.
Black letter and Comments (including the Illustrations) are approved by ALI’s members and the Council and represents the position of the Institute; Reporter’s (or Reporters’) Notes are regarded as the work of the Reporters, and are thus not approved by ALI members or the Council.