MarketBlue sky law
Company Profile

Blue sky law

A blue sky law is a state law in the United States that regulates the offering and sale of securities to protect the public from fraud. Though the specific provisions of these laws vary among states, they all require the registration of all securities offerings and sales, as well as of stockbrokers and brokerage firms. Each state's blue sky law is administered by its appropriate regulatory agency, and most also provide private causes of action for private investors who have been injured by securities fraud.

Origin of term in securities context
Its earliest cited use by the US Supreme Court was in an opinion by Justice Joseph McKenna in Hall v. Geiger-Jones Co., 242 U.S. 539 (1917), a case that addressed the constitutionality of state securities laws. Oddly, McKenna is frequently and erroneously given credit for inventing the term even though J. N. Dolley used the term when he was plumping for passage of the Kansas statute in 1910, and McKenna's own opinion in Hall itself attributes the term to an unnamed earlier source: Kansas Banking Commissioner Dolley, railing against "blue sky merchants" while he pushed for passage of the Kansas statute in 1910, observed that certain fraudulent investments were backed by nothing but the blue skies of Kansas. The Oxford English Dictionary has a cited use dating to 1906. Also, The New York Times (and other national newspapers) frequently reported on the blue sky laws as various states began to enact them between 1911 and 1916. The newspapers expressly used the term blue sky to describe such laws. ==See also==
tickerdossier.comtickerdossier.substack.com