Jim Harper works as the Director of Information Policy at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, but in his spare time he also runs the site Washington Watch to help taxpayers understand what government programs and projects will cost each family in the country. This sounds like fairly uncontroversial stuff, but when Harper recently tried to promote his site by comparing it to an offering from the Library of Congress, he ran into a problem: a Library official asked him to stop using the Library's name critically.

Here's what happened: Washington Watch went wiki (say that three times fast) a few weeks ago. Users can access the site to find out that the Prescription Drug User Fee Amendments of 2007 will cost an American family of three $63.13 each and can use that information to decide if the proposed benefits are worth $63.13 to them. But the site now lets people edit "points in favor" and "points against" each bill as well, and Harper's goal is to make it a central spot for political debate where all sides can put up their best arguments for and against their ideas.

In a press release announcing the update, Harper said that "WashingtonWatch.com provides a more user-friendly and interactive way for the public to learn about legislation than the Library of Congress' THOMAS site. It's all about government transparency." Then came the e-mail.

After the announcement, he was contacted by Matt Raymond, the Director of Communications at the Library (and the author of the Library of Congress' blog). Raymond said that he possessed "statutory and regulatory authority governing unauthorized use of the Library's name and logo and those of Library subunits and programs," and he asked that Harper stop using the names "Library of Congress" and "THOMAS" in his marketing materials.

This didn't sit well with Harper, who basically told Raymond that he was going to use the names whenever he felt like it, and it seemed like such an odd claim for the Library to make that we decided to look into it.

I contacted Raymond about the issue, and he tells Ars that he was acting under Library of Congress Regulation 112, which says that "the use of the Library's name, explicitly or implicitly to endorse a product or service, or materials in any publication is prohibited, except as provided for in this Regulation." For Raymond, the issue here is that Harper was critical of the Library's own work in a way which endorsed his own; as Raymond puts it, "the use of THOMAS in the Washington Watch press release in a negative way is clearly used in the context of endorsement, rather than general criticism."

Raymond claims that he has no intention of trying to silence critics, and points out that the Library's blog has opened itself to reader comments, critical or otherwise. His concern, rather, is "in the context of marketing and endorsement."

Harper doesn't think this sort of reasoning is a good enough to start asking people to stop using the Library's name, and says he's "offended that they think they can control my use of their name for comparative purposes."

"In my day job and in this separate project," he tells Ars, "the goal is to speak truth to power and do more to make it a government of, by, and for the people."