(A) The action of making something public or generally known. With regard to defamation, it is the act of communicating a false statement to a third person. With regard to legal procedure, it is a method of providing legal notice through publication in a recognized and approved newspaper in the relevant country. With regard to copyright law, it is copying the work and making the copies available for sale to the general public. (B)The act by which a thing is made public. 2. It differs from promulgation. 3. Publication has different meanings. When applied to a law, it signifies the rendering public the existence of the law; when it relates to the opening the depositions taken in a case in chancery, it means that liberty is given to the officer in whose custody the depositions of witnesses in a cause are lodged, either by consent of parties, or by the rules or orders of the court, to show the depositions openly, and to give out copies of them. When it refers to a libel, it is its communication to a second or third person, or a greater number. 3. And when spoken of a will, it signifies that the testator has done some act from which it can be concluded that he intended the instrument to operate as his will.
Law Dictionary – Alternative Legal Definition
1. The act of publishing anything or making it public; offering it to public notice, or rendering it accessible to public scrutiny. 2. As descriptive of the publishing of laws and ordinances, “publication” means printing or otherwise reproducing copies of them and distributing them in such a manner as to make their contents easily accessible to the public; it forms no part of the enactment of the law. “Promulgation,” on the other hand, seems to denote the proclamation or announcement of the edict or statute as a preliminary to its acquiring the force and operation of law. But the two terms are often used interchangeably. 3. The formal declaration made by a testator at the time of signing his will that it is his last will and testament. 4. In the law of libel, publication denotes the act of making the defamatory matter known publicly, of disseminating it, or communicating it to one or more persons. 5. In the practice of the states adopting the reformed procedure, and in some others, publication of a summons is the process of giving it currency as an advertisement in a newspaper, under the conditions prescribed by law, as a means of giving notice of the suit to a defendant upon whom personal service cannot be made. 6. In equity practice. The making public the depositions taken in a suit, which have previously been kept private in the office of the examiner. Publication is said to pass when the depositions are so made public, or openly shown, and copies of them given out, in order to the hearing of the cause. 3 BL Comm. 450. 7. In copyright law. The act of making public a book, writing, chart, map, etc.; that is, offering or communicating it to the public by the sale or distribution of copies.