1. Introduction

Jefferson County Public Schools planned to administer a student mental-health survey published by NCS Pearson, Inc. Miranda Stovall—an advocate for parents’ rights—suspected the survey included sensitive questions and sought a copy under the Kentucky Open Records Act. Jefferson County denied her request to obtain a copy (while offering inspection), relying on the Act’s exemption for records “prohibited by federal law or regulation” from disclosure, KRS § 61.878(1)(k), and asserting the survey was copyrighted.

Kentucky law provided multiple state remedies (review by the Kentucky Attorney General with possible state-court appeal, or direct suit in state court). Stovall bypassed those avenues and instead sued in federal court, seeking a declaratory judgment that providing her a copy would qualify as “fair use” under federal copyright law. The district court dismissed for lack of jurisdiction; the Sixth Circuit affirmed.

Key issues. (1) Whether Stovall’s declaratory-judgment suit “arises under” the Copyright Act for purposes of 28 U.S.C. § 1338(a). (2) Whether, even if jurisdictional theories were plausible, Stovall alleged an Article III “case or controversy” based on a sufficiently real and immediate threat of infringement litigation.

2. Summary of the Opinion

The Sixth Circuit held that federal subject-matter jurisdiction was absent. Although the Declaratory Judgment Act allows a federal court to declare rights, it does not supply jurisdiction by itself. Stovall’s entitlement to a copy of the survey arose (if at all) from Kentucky’s open-records statute, not from any cause of action created by the Copyright Act. Copyright law entered only as a potential defense—Jefferson County’s asserted justification for denial—so the case did not “arise under” federal copyright law.

Separately, the court explained that Stovall did not plausibly allege a sufficiently imminent infringement dispute with NCS Pearson to satisfy Article III standing for declaratory relief. She alleged only a speculative possibility of future litigation, with no threatened suit, no history of enforcement against her, and no facts suggesting NCS Pearson even knew of her before the lawsuit.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited

The opinion is a jurisdiction-and-justiciability synthesis. It draws heavily from Supreme Court “arising under” doctrine, the declaratory-judgment “look-through” principle, and Article III standing decisions, while also engaging circuit authority about copyright jurisdiction.

A. Limited jurisdiction; the Declaratory Judgment Act is not jurisdiction-conferring

• Kokkonen v. Guardian Life Ins. Co. of Am., 511 U.S. 375 (1994): Federal courts possess only jurisdiction authorized by the Constitution and statute; jurisdiction cannot be expanded by judicial decree. The court uses Kokkonen as the baseline rule that frames the entire dispute.
• Steel Co. v. Citizens for a Better Env't, 523 U.S. 83 (1998): A federal court may not opine on the meaning or constitutionality of laws without jurisdiction; doing so upsets separation of powers. The court invokes Steel Co. to emphasize that jurisdiction is not a technicality but a constitutional boundary.
• Saginaw County v. STAT Emergency Med. Servs., Inc., 946 F.3d 951 (6th Cir. 2020): The Declaratory Judgment Act does not supply jurisdiction and does not permit adjudication of theoretical disputes. This case supports both the jurisdictional and justiciability aspects of the Sixth Circuit’s reasoning.
• Skelly Oil Co. v. Phillips Petroleum Co., 339 U.S. 667 (1950); Toledo v. Jackson, 485 F.3d 836 (6th Cir. 2007); Heydon v. MediaOne of Se. Mich., Inc., 327 F.3d 466 (6th Cir. 2003): Together, these authorities stand for the principle that declaratory relief requires an independent basis for subject-matter jurisdiction; the DJA does not create federal-question jurisdiction.

B. “Arising under” jurisdiction under § 1338 tracks § 1331; defenses do not create jurisdiction

• Holmes Grp., Inc. v. Vornado Air Circulation Sys., Inc., 535 U.S. 826 (2002): Because § 1338(a) uses the same “arising under” language as § 1331, courts apply the same test. This is the bridge that imports general federal-question doctrine into copyright jurisdiction.
• American Well Works Co. v. Layne & Bowler Co., 241 U.S. 257 (1916): A case arises under the law that creates the cause of action. Stovall’s cause of action, by her own pleading, derived from Kentucky law (KRS § 61.874(1)), so American Well Works cuts against jurisdiction.
• Gunn v. Minton, 568 U.S. 251 (2013): State-law claims can “arise under” federal law when they necessarily raise disputed and substantial federal issues that a federal forum may entertain. The Sixth Circuit uses Gunn to show why Stovall’s case fails: copyright appears only as a defense, not as a necessary element of her claim.
• Franchise Tax Bd. v. Constr. Laborers Vacation Tr., 463 U.S. 1 (1983): Federal-question jurisdiction cannot rest on a federal defense, even one anticipated in the complaint. This is central to rejecting Stovall’s attempt to plead around the well-pleaded complaint rule via declaratory judgment.
• Vaden v. Discover Bank, 556 U.S. 49 (2009): Reinforces that declaratory actions cannot be used to anticipate defenses to manufacture “arising under” jurisdiction.
• Gully v. First Nat'l Bank, 299 U.S. 109 (1936): A federal issue “lurking in the background” does not create federal jurisdiction. The court uses this as a vivid way to describe why copyright law’s role here is insufficient.
• Severe Records, LLC v. Rich, 658 F.3d 571 (6th Cir. 2011): A case does not arise under copyright law merely because it relates to a copyrighted product. This Sixth Circuit precedent anchors the conclusion in circuit law.
• Bd. of Chosen Freeholders of Burlington Cnty. v. Tombs, 215 F. App'x 80 (3rd Cir. 2006): Persuasive authority holding that copyright defenses to public-records demands do not create federal jurisdiction. The Sixth Circuit relies on Tombs for a closely analogous scenario.

C. Preemption and “exclusive jurisdiction” do not expand federal jurisdiction to defense-driven disputes

• Ritchie v. Williams, 395 F.3d 283 (6th Cir. 2005): Discusses Copyright Act preemption of state-law claims equivalent to infringement rights. The Sixth Circuit distinguishes Stovall’s claim: an open-records access dispute is not a “doppelganger” infringement action.
• Beneficial Nat'l Bank v. Anderson, 539 U.S. 1 (2003): Addresses complete preemption where federal law provides the exclusive cause of action and remedies. The court cites it to show why open-records access claims are not completely preempted by copyright.
• Caterpillar Inc. v. Williams, 482 U.S. 386 (1987): The defense of preemption does not confer jurisdiction even if it is the only real issue. This forecloses the “copyright preemption implies federal forum” argument.
• Christianson v. Colt Indus. Operating Corp., 486 U.S. 800 (1988): Patent analogue confirming that federal defenses (there, patent-law defenses) do not create federal jurisdiction. The Sixth Circuit uses it to reinforce symmetry across IP regimes.
• Zellner v. Cedarburg Sch. Dist., 731 N.W.2d 240 (Wis. 2007): A concrete example that state courts may adjudicate federal fair-use questions incidentally when embedded in state open-records disputes.
• 28 U.S.C. § 1257: The court notes Supreme Court review of state-court judgments as a uniformity safeguard when federal issues are “drawn in question,” undermining the claim that only federal trial courts can police copyright uniformity.

D. The role—and limits—of T.B. Harms Co. v. Eliscu

• T.B. Harms Co. v. Eliscu, 339 F.2d 823 (2d Cir. 1964): Stovall invoked Judge Friendly’s formulation that jurisdiction exists where a claim requires construction of the Copyright Act or federal principles control. The Sixth Circuit explains that Eliscu does not help Stovall because (i) Eliscu itself found no jurisdiction, and (ii) its test aligns with later Supreme Court “necessarily raises”/preemption frameworks rather than expanding them.
• Supporting citations reinforcing that point: Bassett v. Mashantucket Pequot Tribe, 204 F.3d 343 (2d Cir. 2000); Scholastic Ent., Inc. v. Fox Ent. Grp., Inc., 336 F.3d 982 (9th Cir. 2003); Merrell Dow Pharms. Inc. v. Thompson, 478 U.S. 804 (1986).
• The opinion also lists circuits that have leaned on Eliscu in various ways—Gener-Villar v. Adcom Grp., Inc., 417 F.3d 201 (1st Cir. 2005); Arthur Young & Co. v. City of Richmond, 895 F.2d 967 (4th Cir. 1990); JustMed, Inc. v. Byce, 600 F.3d 1118 (9th Cir. 2010)—to underscore that its own approach is mainstream rather than idiosyncratic.

E. Article III standing and “actual controversy” in declaratory actions

• Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555 (1992); Mikel v. Quin, 58 F.4th 252 (6th Cir. 2023): Standing requires actual or imminent injury, traceability, and redressability.
• Muskrat v. United States, 219 U.S. 346 (1911): The DJA cannot be used to obtain advisory opinions about law validity absent a real controversy.
• MedImmune, Inc. v. Genentech, Inc., 549 U.S. 118 (2007): Declaratory relief requires “a substantial controversy, between parties having adverse legal interests, of sufficient immediacy and reality.”
• Susan B. Anthony List v. Driehaus, 573 U.S. 149 (2014): Used to contrast concrete enforcement threats with speculative fears.
• Clapper v. Amnesty Int'l USA, 568 U.S. 398 (2013): “Speculative fear” of future injury is not enough.
• Goodrich-Gulf Chemicals v. Phillips Petroleum, 376 F.2d 1015 (6th Cir. 1967): A directly analogous Sixth Circuit decision rejecting declaratory standing where there was no allegation of infringement charge, threat of suit, or adversary action. The court treats Goodrich-Gulf as controlling in principle.
• Chase Bank v. City of Cleveland, 695 F.3d 548 (6th Cir. 2012): Distinguished because it did not address constitutional standing; it cannot support the proposition that hypothetical coercive action suffices.

F. Kentucky open-records burden and the “defense posture” of copyright

• Hardin Cnty. Schs. v. Foster, 40 S.W.3d 865 (Ky. 2001): In Kentucky, the public agency bears the burden to prove an exception applies. The Sixth Circuit uses this to show why copyright enters only as the agency’s defense to the open-records entitlement, reinforcing the well-pleaded complaint rule analysis.

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3.2 Legal Reasoning

The court’s reasoning proceeds in two major moves: (A) subject-matter jurisdiction under § 1338(a) and (B) Article III standing/justiciability for declaratory relief.

A. Why the claim did not “arise under” copyright law (three routes rejected)

1. No federal cause of action. Stovall’s asserted entitlement to obtain a copy of the survey comes from Kentucky’s open-records statute (KRS § 61.874(1)), not from the Copyright Act. Under American Well Works Co. v. Layne & Bowler Co., the law creating the cause of action typically supplies “arising under” jurisdiction; here that law is state, not federal.
2. No necessarily raised federal issue. Under Gunn v. Minton and Holmes Grp., Inc. v. Vornado Air Circulation Sys., Inc., a state claim can arise under federal law only if resolving it necessarily requires deciding a disputed and substantial federal question. The Sixth Circuit emphasizes the defense posture: Kentucky law obligates disclosure subject to exceptions, and the agency bears the burden to prove an exception (Hardin Cnty. Schs. v. Foster). Jefferson County invoked copyright as “federal law” within an exception—i.e., a defense. Under Franchise Tax Bd. v. Constr. Laborers Vacation Tr., anticipated defenses do not create federal-question jurisdiction. The court thus treats copyright’s “fair use” question as, at most, background.
3. No complete preemption / no infringement-equivalent claim. The court recognizes copyright preemption in the infringement-equivalent context (Ritchie v. Williams; 17 U.S.C. § 301(a)) but concludes Stovall’s claim is not a surrogate infringement claim; it is an access-to-records claim. The Copyright Act does not provide an exclusive cause of action for access to public records, nor does it supply the remedial scheme for such access disputes (citing Beneficial Nat'l Bank v. Anderson and analogizing to Bd. of Chosen Freeholders of Burlington Cnty. v. Tombs). Therefore, there is no “complete preemption” pathway to federal court.

B. Why “exclusive federal copyright jurisdiction” does not bar state courts from incidentally applying fair use

Stovall’s central policy claim was that because federal courts have exclusive jurisdiction over copyright claims (28 U.S.C. § 1338(a)), state courts should not decide fair-use questions. The court rejects this as a misunderstanding of “arising under.” Section 1338 is treated as a subset of § 1331: it makes federal courts the exclusive forum only when the claim actually arises under copyright law. If the claim does not arise under federal law, the exclusivity provision is irrelevant; state courts retain authority to decide incidental federal questions, including fair use (with Zellner v. Cedarburg Sch. Dist. as an example and 28 U.S.C. § 1257 as a uniformity backstop).

C. Standing: no substantial controversy with NCS Pearson

Even assuming some arguable federal-interest framing, the court separately explains that Stovall’s declaratory request lacked the immediacy and reality required for Article III. Under MedImmune, Inc. v. Genentech, Inc., declaratory actions require an “actual controversy.” Stovall alleged no threatened infringement action, no prior enforcement pattern, and no facts indicating NCS Pearson knew of her before she sued. Her concern that Pearson “might” sue is the sort of speculative fear rejected by Clapper v. Amnesty Int'l USA.

The court’s reliance on Goodrich-Gulf Chemicals v. Phillips Petroleum is particularly important: it frames this as a settled Sixth Circuit principle in the IP context—declaratory jurisdiction is improper where the plaintiff pleads no adversary action, no implicit charge, and no threat of suit. The opinion also undercuts Stovall’s reliance on Chase Bank v. City of Cleveland by noting that it did not address constitutional standing.

3.3 Impact

The decision’s practical effect is to channel “copyright-as-defense” open-records disputes into state administrative and judicial review processes, rather than federal declaratory litigation.

• Constraining federal forum shopping in open-records controversies. Requesters cannot repackage a state public-records denial into a federal declaratory fair-use action merely because an agency cites copyright. The well-pleaded complaint rule, reinforced here, blocks that maneuver.
• Reaffirming state courts’ competence to apply federal copyright defenses incidentally. The opinion strongly signals that state courts can decide fair-use issues when they are embedded in state-law claims (as in open-records litigation), subject to Supreme Court review under 28 U.S.C. § 1257.
• Ratcheting up “actual controversy” requirements for DJA suits involving potential IP enforcement. Parties seeking declaratory clearance (e.g., fair use or noninfringement) must plead concrete facts of threatened or likely enforcement. A generalized “specter” of suit—without threats, history, or awareness—will not suffice.
• Implications for public agencies and vendors. Agencies that contract for proprietary instruments (surveys, tests, curricula) may continue to rely on state-law exemptions referencing federal law; challengers will likely need to litigate the scope of the exemption—and any fair-use or copyright limitations—through state channels first.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

• “Arising under” jurisdiction (28 U.S.C. § 1331 / § 1338). A federal court can hear a case because it is “about” federal law only when federal law creates the claim, or the state-law claim cannot be resolved without deciding a necessary and substantial federal issue, or federal law completely preempts the state claim. If federal law appears only as a defense, jurisdiction usually does not exist.
• Well-pleaded complaint rule. Courts look to what the plaintiff must prove to win—not to defenses the defendant might raise. Anticipating and disputing a defense (here, copyright/fair use) does not create federal jurisdiction.
• Declaratory Judgment Act (28 U.S.C. § 2201). It is a procedural device that lets courts declare rights, but it does not itself give federal courts power to hear a case. You still need an independent basis for jurisdiction and an Article III controversy.
• Fair use. A copyright doctrine that sometimes permits copying without permission. In this case, fair use mattered only if copyright law validly barred disclosure; because that issue arose defensively within a state open-records dispute, it did not supply federal jurisdiction.
• Article III standing / “actual controversy.” Federal courts do not issue advisory opinions. For declaratory relief, the plaintiff must show a real and immediate dispute (e.g., a credible threat of enforcement). Speculation that a company might sue someday is not enough.
• Complete preemption vs. ordinary preemption. Ordinary preemption is a defense (and usually does not create federal jurisdiction). Complete preemption is rare: it exists only when federal law replaces the state claim with a federal cause of action. The court held copyright does not completely preempt a state open-records access claim.

5. Conclusion

Miranda Stovall v. Jefferson Cnty. Bd. of Educ. stands for a firm jurisdictional boundary: litigants may not transform a state open-records dispute into a federal copyright case by seeking a declaratory “fair use” ruling when copyright is only an anticipated defense. The Sixth Circuit further reinforces that declaratory actions in the IP space require a concrete, immediate controversy—something more than a generalized fear of suit. The decision thus preserves the well-pleaded complaint rule’s gatekeeping function, confirms the limited role of the Declaratory Judgment Act, and clarifies that state courts remain competent to adjudicate incidental federal copyright defenses in state-law proceedings.