House Passes Bill to Create New U.S. Code Title for Space Laws

House Passes Bill to Create New U.S. Code Title for Space Laws

Last week the House passed H.R. 3237, which would create a new Title of the U.S. Code for the laws that Congress already has passed regarding national and commercial space programs. Currently the space-related laws are in Title 15, Title 42 or Title 49. H.R. 3237 would group them into a new Title 51 as well as tidy them up by repealing obsolete provisions (e.g. a requirement for a report to be submitted a decade ago), correcting technical errors and making other non-substantive changes. As the bill report (H. Rept. 111-325) explains:

“In restating existing law, this bill consolidates various provisions of law which have been enacted separately over a period of many years, reorganizing them, conforming style and terminology, modernizing obsolete language, and correcting drafting errors. These changes are not intended to have substantive effect, or to impair in any way the precedential value of earlier judicial decisions or other interpretations.”

The House Judiciary Committee’s efforts to create a new Title for space-related laws began in 2005 (the 109th Congress), but the previous bills were never reported from committee.

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