Public access isn’t an absolute, and must be balanced with costs and profits.
Mendelson 15 – Joseph L. Sax Collegiate Professor of Law at the University of Michigan, J.D. from Yale University.
Nina Mendelson, “Public Access to the Law Must Be Taken More Seriously,” The Regulatory Review, 01-28-2015, https://www.theregreview.org/2015/01/28/mendelson-public-access/
Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS) senior attorney Emily Bremer has argued in detail that public access to the law must be balanced against other values, such as reducing agency costs associated with regulation. In particular, she cites the example of PHMSA, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, which was compelled by statute to ensure that all its IBR standards were freely available online beginning in 2013, until Congress cut the requirement back several months later.