Justice, Commerce Oppose IP Act

The Departments of Justice and Commerce came out against key elements in the Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights Act, a bill that would boost the government's efforts to crack down on intellectual piracy, saying that they would turn the Justice Department into a de facto legal team for private industry and result in Congress trying to run the president's office for him. DOJ and Commerce said they support the goal of protecting intellectual property rights, but in a letter to Leahy and Specter, top lawyers with both departments said they could not support authorizing the attorney general to pursue civil suits against copyright infringers, saying that it would result in government lawyers working pro bono to collect judgments for industry. They said that with a limited budget, pursuing civil cases would have to come at the expense of criminal prosecutions, which only the government can pursue, adding, "The resources of the Department of Justice should be used for the public benefit, not on behalf of particular industries that can avail themselves of the existing civil-enforcement provisions." They also argued that creating a separate intellectual-property-enforcement officer in the executive office of the president would be "a legislative intrusion into the internal structure and composition of the president's administration" and, thus, a violation of separation of powers. They said they were reserving judgment on the final bill in the hopes that it could be changed. Otherwise, they could not advise the president to support it.

Gigi B. Sohn, president and co-founder of Public Knowledge, said, "We are pleased that the Justice and Commerce departments agree with us that it would be a mistake to give the Justice Department the authority to pursue civil suits in copyright cases. As the departments said in the letter, and as Public Knowledge has said repeatedly, the private sector has all the resources necessary to pursue cases that companies want to pursue. The government should not be turned into the law firm for wealthy copyright holders. We hope that the sponsors of the bill will take these views seriously and will forgo action on the legislation for the foreseeable future."