I do a
lot of copyright work – registering copyrights, and enforcing my clients’
copyrights. There is currently a sign on
the copyright office web site that reads “The U.S. Copyright Office is closed
and www.copyright.gov is not available
due to the federal government shutdown … copyright registrations will not be
processed until the Copyright Office reopens.”
This
has the potential to become a huge problem. If copyright owners can’t register
their copyrights, they can’t get into court to protect their rights.
I also
do a lot of trademark work. I went to
the USPTO.gov site and discovered that due to some pre‑planning the trademark
office is using “prior year reserve fee collections” to remain open for
“approximately four weeks”. Then the
trademark office would shut down except for a “very small staff” that would
continue to accept new applications.
However, presumably the new
applications would not be processed.
Finally
I wondered what the effect of the shutdown would be on the Federal Court
System. I learned that because the
Constitution guarantees criminal defendants the right to a speedy trial, the
Federal courts must remain open as an essential government service. However, most commentators think that civil
litigation would be suspended and that so‑called non‑essential employees (the
people in the clerk’s office—who are pretty essential in my book ) will be
furloughed without pay and the system will grind to a halt.
If the
shutdown continues, the ripple effects
are going to be significant. I was
already disgusted after hearing about Head Start daycare programs being shut
down as well as the exacerbation of the problems in the Veteran’s
Administration but I did not think that my practice or my ability to serve my
clients would be affected. Apparently I
was wrong.
This
needs to end.
