## Facts

- Fourth Estate Public Benefit Corporation produced online news articles and licensed them to Wall-Street.com, LLC.
- The license required Wall-Street.com to remove Fourth Estate content when cancelling the account.
- Wall-Street.com cancelled the license but continued posting Fourth Estate’s articles.
- Fourth Estate submitted copyright registration applications for the articles to the U.S. Copyright Office.
- Before the Copyright Office acted on the applications (granting or refusing registration), Fourth Estate filed a federal copyright infringement suit under 17 U.S.C. § 501.
- The dispute turned on 17 U.S.C. § 411(a), which bars instituting a civil infringement action for a U.S. work until “registration of the copyright claim has been made,” subject to limited statutory exceptions.

## Issues

1. For purposes of 17 U.S.C. § 411(a), is “registration ... made” when the copyright owner files a complete application (application, deposit, and fee), or only when the Copyright Office acts by granting or refusing registration?

## Decision

- The Supreme Court unanimously affirmed dismissal of the complaint as premature.
- The Court held that “registration ... has been made” under § 411(a) only when the Copyright Office registers the claim or refuses registration.
- Because Fourth Estate sued before the Office acted on its applications, § 411(a) barred the action.
- The ruling resolved a circuit split by adopting the “registration approach” and rejecting the “application approach.”

## Legal Principles

- For U.S. works, § 411(a) generally requires Copyright Office action (registration or refusal) as a precondition to filing a civil copyright infringement action.
- Treating an application as “registration” conflicts with § 411(a)’s structure, including the provision expressly authorizing suit after refusal of registration, and would make that provision largely redundant.
- The Copyright Act’s usage of “registration” consistently refers to an administrative determination by the Copyright Office, not the claimant’s act of applying.
- Although processing delays may occur, courts may not alter § 411(a)’s timing requirement on policy grounds; limited statutory mechanisms (including preregistration for certain works and special treatment for live broadcasts) indicate Congress chose narrow exceptions rather than a general application-based rule.
- Once registration is granted, a copyright owner may seek remedies for infringement occurring both before and after registration.

## Conclusion

The Court held that a copyright claimant may not file a federal infringement action for a U.S. work until the Copyright Office registers the work or refuses registration, making a complete application alone insufficient to satisfy § 411(a).


Fourth Estate Pub. Benefit Corp. v. Wall-Street.com, LLC, 139 S. Ct. 881 (2019)