Legal Law Book Sales

Legal Law Book Sales
What specific law grants the right to sell your own possessions?

What specific law or piece of legislation grants a person the right to sell a hardback book to someone else they legally bought?

Say you bought a book at a book store, what grants you the right to resell that book? I imagine it is the same one that makes yard sales legal. Several people I know are worried about copyright infringement of selling hardback books legally purchased.

None. That's not how the law works.

You have the legal right to do ANYTHING - unless a law says you can't.

Accordingly, there is no law that says "you can sell something that you own." You can sell anything you own unless there is a law that says you CAN'T.

If the State wants to prosecute you for something, they have to be able to point at a specific written law and say "You broke this law."

EDIT.... The post above about the first sale doctrine is basically right, but it misses the point a *little* bit. First sale doctrine doesn't really "give you the right" to sell a book that you own. What it really is is that copyright law establishes sets out situations where you CANNOT legally sell something that you have bought. The first sale doctrine excludes legally purchased media from that restriction - thus leaving intact your common law right to sell anything you want unless a law says you can't.

Richard

J.D. Salinger: "Keep Your Hands Off My Legacy"
The author was as protective of his writings as he was of his privacy. And that is likely to remain even now that he has died