Barbara Ringer

Barbara Ringer (May 29, 1925 – April 9, 2009) was one of the lead architects of the 1976 Copyright Act. She spent much of her career lobbying Congress and drafting legislation that overhauled the 1909 Copyright Act. During her three decades with the United States Copyright Office, Ringer gained a reputation as an authority on copyright law.

Early life Barbara Alice Ringer was born in Lafayette, Indiana on May 29, 1925. Her mother was the only woman in the University of Michigan School of Law Class of 1923.

Career Ringer began her career on the Copyright Office staff in 1949. Ringer retired in May 1980 and entered private practice with the Washington, D.C. law firm, Spencer & Kaye.

Ringer published studies, monographs, and articles in legal and professional journals and conducted empirical research about copyright law throughout her career. She noted her superior qualifications, including her experience and performance reviews, as evidence of sex discrimination. Major copyright law changes in the 1976 Act included expanding the term of copyright protection from 28 years to life of the author plus 50 years and codifying the fair use doctrine.

In 1977, Ringer was awarded the President's Award for Distinguished Federal Civilian Service for her role in the passage of the 1976 Copyright Act. Ringer later drafted the Copyright Renewal Act of 1992, which repealed termination and provided for automatic renewal for works copyrighted between 1964 and 1997.

Ringer later acknowledged the inadequacies of her legislation, calling it "a good 1950 copyright law." She advocated that the public interest in copyright "should be to provide the widest possible access to information of all kinds." Ringer collaborated with copyright attorneys, academics, librarians, content creators, and members of the judiciary to draft the Copyright Reform Act of 1993, but it was not enacted.

Ringer moved to rural Bath County, Virginia, where she cataloged books at her local public library. Ringer died in Lexington, Virginia on April 9, 2009, due to complications from dementia. She willed her collection of 20,000 movies and 1,500 books on film to the Library of Congress.