As indicated in recent postings ("Fair Copyright in Research Works Act: Ten Associations and Advocacy Groups Send Letter to Judiciary Committee Members Opposing Act" and "Urgent Call to Action: Conyers Bill Opposing NIH Open Access Policy May Soon Come to House Vote"), the fight over the Fair Copyright in Research Works Act (H.R. 801) is heating up.

If you want to oppose the bill and support the NIH Public Access policy and open access, you should contact members of the House Judiciary Committee and your Representative immediately by letter, e-mail, fax, or phone. If a Judiciary Committee member is in your district, your opposition will have considerably more impact. If you are uncertain, about who your House member is, you can use the The Hill's search form to find out. The "Contact" tab for the House member's The Hill record, includes a "Contact [Congressional representative] via Web Form" function that can be used to send e-mail messages.

Below is a list of Judiciary Committee members and a draft letter from the Alliance for Taxpayer Access’ call to action.

• John Conyers, Jr., (D) Michigan, 14th, Chair: john.conyers@mail.house.gov, e-mail form, 202-225-5126, fax: 202-225-0072
• Tammy Baldwin, (D) Wisconsin, 2nd: e-mail form, 202-225-2906, fax: 202-225-6942
• Howard Berman, (D) California, 28th: e-mail form, 202-225-4695, fax: 202-225-3196
• Rick Boucher, (D) Virginia, 9th: e-mail form, 202-225-3861, fax: 202-225-0442
• Jason Chaffetz, (R) Utah, 3rd: e-mail form, 202-225-7751, fax: (202) 225-5629
• Howard Coble, (R) North Carolina, 6th: howard.coble@mail.house.gov, 202-225-3065, fax: 202-225-8611
• Steve Cohen, (D) Tennessee, 9th: e-mail form, 202-225-3265, fax: 202-225-5663
• Bill Delahunt, (D) Massachusetts, 10th: William.Delahunt@mail.house.gov, 202-225-3111, fax: 202-225-5658
• Randy Forbes, (R) Virginia, 4th: The Hill form, 202-225-6365, fax: 202-226-1170
• Trent Franks, (R) Arizona, 2nd: e-mail form, 202-225-4576, fax: 202-225-6328
• Elton Gallegly, (R) California, 24th: The Hill form, 202-225-5811, fax: 202-225-1100
• Louie Gohmert, (R) Texas, 1st: e-mail form, 202-225-3035, 202-226-1230 fax
• Charles Gonzalez, (D) Texas, 20th: e-mail form, 202-225-3236, fax: 202-225-1915
• Bob Goodlatte, (R) Virginia, 6th: e-mail form, 202-225-5431, fax: 202-225-9681
• Luis Gutierrez, (D) Illinois, 4th: e-mail form, 202-225-8203, fax: 202-225-7810
• Gregg Harper, (R) Mississippi, 3rd: e-mail form, 202-225-5031, fax: 202-225-5797
• Darrell Issa, (R) California, 49th: e-mail form, 202-225-3906, fax: 202-225-3303
• Henry "Hank" Johnson, Jr., (D) Georgia, 4th: e-mail form, 202-225-1605, fax: 202-226-0691
• Jim Jordan, (R) Ohio, 4th: e-mail form, 202-225-2676, fax: 202-226-0577
• Steve King, (R) Iowa, 5th: e-mail form, 202-225-4426, fax: 202-225-3193
• Sheila Jackson Lee, (D) Texas, 18th: e-mail form, 202-225-3816, fax: 202-225-3317
• Zoe Lofgren, (D) California, 16th: e-mail form, 202-225-3072
• Dan Lungren, (R) California, 3rd: e-mail form, 202-225-5716, fax: 202-226-1298
• Dan Maffei, (D) New York, 25th: e-mail form, 202-225-3701, fax: 202-225-4042
• Jerrold Nadler, (D) New York, 8th: e-mail form, 202-225-5635, fax: 202-225-6923
• Pedro Pierluisi, (D) Puerto Rico, Resident Commissioner: e-mail form, (202) 225-2615
• Ted Poe, (R) Texas, 2nd: e-mail form, 202-225-6565, fax: 202-225-5547
• Tom Rooney, (R) Florida, 16th: e-mail form, 202-225-5792, fax: 202-225-3132
• Linda Sanchez, (D) California, 39th: The Hill form 202-225-6676, fax: 202-226-1012
• Adam B. Schiff, (D) California, 29th: e-mail form 202-225-4176, fax: 202-225-5828
• Bobby Scott, Virginia, 3rd: The Hill form, 202-225-8351, fax:202-225-8354
• F. James Sensenbrenner, Jr., (R) Wisconsin, 5th: e-mail form, 202-225-5101, fax: (202) 225-3190
• Brad Sherman, (D) California, 27: e-mail form, 202-225-5911, fax:202-225-5879
• Lamar Smith, (R) Texas, 21st: The Hill form, 202-225-4236, fax: 202-225-8628
• Debbie Wasserman Schultz, (D) Florida, 20th: The Hill form, 202-225-7931, fax: 202-226-2052
• Maxine Waters, (D) California, 35th: e-mail form, 202-225-2201, fax: 202-225-7854
• Melvin L. Watt ("Mel"), (D) North Carolina, 12th: e-mail form, 202-225-1510, fax: 202-25-1512
• Anthony D. Weiner, (D) New York, 9th: e-mail form, 202-225-6616, fax: 202-226-7253
• Robert Wexler, (D) Florida, 19th: e-mail form, phone: 202-225-3001, fax: 202-225-5974

Draft letter text:

Dear Representative;

On behalf of [your organization], I strongly urge you to oppose H.R. 801, “the Fair Copyright in Research Works Act,” introduced to the House Judiciary Committee on February 3, 2009. This bill would amend the U.S. Copyright Code, prohibiting federal agencies from requiring as a condition of funding agreements public access to the products of the research they fund. This will significantly inhibit our ability to advance scientific discovery and to stimulate innovation in all scientific disciplines.

Most critically, H.R. 801 would reverse the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Public Access Policy, prohibit American taxpayers from accessing the results of the crucial biomedical research funded by their taxpayer dollars, and stifle critical advancements in life-saving research and scientific discovery.

Because of the NIH Public Access Policy, millions of Americans now have access to vital health care information from the NIH’s PubMed Central database. Under the current policy, nearly 3,000 new biomedical manuscripts are deposited for public accessibility each month. H.R.801 would prohibit the deposit of these manuscripts, seriously impeding the ability of researchers, physicians, health care professionals, and families to access and use this critical health-related information in a timely manner.

H.R. 801 affects not only the results of biomedical research produced by the NIH, but also scientific research coming from all other federal agencies. Access to critical information on energy, the environment, climate change, and hundreds of other areas that directly impact the lives and well being of the public would be unfairly limited by this proposed legislation.

[Why you support taxpayer access and the NIH policy].

The NIH and other agencies must be allowed to ensure timely, public access to the results of research funded with taxpayer dollars. Please oppose H.R.801.

Postscript: ALA has issued a call to action about the Fair Copyright in Research Works Act (H.R. 801). The alert includes a link to a Web form that will allow you to e-mail a House Judiciary Committee Member from your district about the bill (will not work if your Representative does not serve on the Judiciary Committee).

The Alliance for Taxpayer Access has a Web form (with letter text) that you can use to e-mail your Congressional representatives.

The bill has been referred to the Subcommittee on Courts and Competition Policy.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 15th, 2009 at 8:18 pm and is filed under Copyright, Legislation, Open Access, Publishing, Scholarly Journals, Self-Archiving. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.