The question of publishing laws freely has been decided in some cases involving West Publishing, which sought to prevent the publication of some state statutes it had its hand in.  They got spanked and it was ruled that public laws are public laws - nobody can claim copyright rights in them.

The difference with the NEC is that it is devised by the NFPA, but then adopted by cities.  My city uses the following terminology in its adoption of the NEC:

"The 1999 National Electrical Code as published by the National Fire Protection Association, a copy of which shall be filed with the office of the city secretary and available for public inspection, is hereby adopted and designated as the electrical code of the city, the same as though that edition of such code were copied at length herein, subject to deletions and amendments enumerated in section 28-62."

Now it seems to me that this means that the electrical code of the city now reads identically to the NEC.  Now why can't I publish my city's electrical code?




>>I suspect that as long as the city made it 'reasonably free' (as in beer) through libraries or on loan (perhaps with small deposit) from the engineer's office, then the courts would consider that 'good enough'.<<

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