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republic-os/legal/us/code/title-28/chapter-31/section-516.md
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Fabio 76b8ec33a7 Legal corpus: the complete U.S. Code (59,740 sections, all 53 titles)
Ingested titles 12–51 and 54 from OLRC USLM XML @119-100 (the whole Code
now, uniform edition; Title 53 is reserved/empty). LegalText 11,221 ->
59,740; repo total 105,704 records. Deterministic (byte-identical rerun,
verified on Title 42's 8,356 sections); make check green. make
legal-us-code default now covers every title.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-07-06 10:51:44 -04:00

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---
type: "LegalText"
title: "28 U.S.C. § 516"
description: "Conduct of litigation reserved to Department of Justice"
jurisdiction: "us"
corpus: "united_states_code"
kind: "code_section"
title_number: 28
title_name: "JUDICIARY AND JUDICIAL PROCEDURE"
chapter_number: "31"
chapter_name: "THE ATTORNEY GENERAL"
section: "516"
citation: "28 U.S.C. § 516"
status: "current"
release_point: "119-100"
release_date: "2026-06-26"
source: "official"
source_url: "https://uscode.house.gov/download/releasepoints/us/pl/119/100/xml_usc28@119-100.zip"
source_identifier: "/us/usc/t28/s516"
source_file: "data/legal/raw/us/code/title-28/usc28.xml"
source_hash: "ce8e239f37e203a79a2d43fb965cc10be6811547ec04d1551d7ba789b4beeb0f"
raw_snapshot_hash: "3390f867a2c02f5d0c496269da780795fe19663a090a3040c64a9ee0a541cdcf"
text_hash: "ecf34423b4e2b351e729301001e6f9a01824a61658e6efdc38b1bd8f0ed966bb"
retrieved_at: "2026-07-04"
confidence: "official"
tags: ["legal", "us-code"]
---
# 28 U.S.C. § 516 - Conduct of litigation reserved to Department of Justice
## Text
Except as otherwise authorized by law, the conduct of litigation in which the United States, an agency, or officer thereof is a party, or is interested, and securing evidence therefor, is reserved to officers of the Department of Justice, under the direction of the Attorney General.
(Added Pub. L. 89554, § 4(c), Sept. 6, 1966, 80 Stat. 613.)
## Notes
Historical and Revision Notes DerivationU.S. CodeRevised Statutes andStatutes at Large  5 U.S.C. 306.R.S. § 361.   Sept. 3, 1954, ch. 1263, § 11, 68 Stat. 1229. The section is revised to express the effect of the law. As agency heads have long employed, with the approval of Congress, attorneys to advise them in the conduct of their official duties, the first 56 words of R.S. § 361 and of former section 306 of title 5 are omitted as obsolete. The section concentrates the authority for the conduct of litigation in the Department of Justice. The words “Except as otherwise authorized by law,” are added to provide for existing and future exceptions (e.g., section 1037 of title 10). The words “an agency” are added for clarity and to align this section with section 519 which is of similar import. The words “as such officer” are omitted as unnecessary since it is implied that the officer is a party in his official capacity as an officer. So much as prohibits the employment of counsel, other than in the Department of Justice, to conduct litigation is omitted as covered by R.S. § 365, which is codified in section 3106 of title 5, United States Code.