A Multidimensional Problem

摘要

Federal agencies often given legal effect to privately developed standards by incorporating them by reference in regulations. The practice, though obscure, is longstanding. The provision of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) that permits the incorporation by reference of "matter reasonably available to the class of persons affected thereby" was enacted in 1966. And agencies' incorporation by reference of voluntary consensus standards gives effect to a federal standards policy that emerged in the late 1970s, was first embraced by the Executive in 1982, and was partially codified by Congress in the National Technology Transfer and Advancement Act of 1995.