Can you help us trace it further back with an older citation? That would be much appreciated.

10 May 2012: https://blog.abevoelker.com/gitlaw-github-for-laws-and-legal...

I assume if my google-fu were better, I could find references to "RCS for lawyers" or "SCCS for lawyers" though, that were decades old.

Late 2012: https://github.com/bundestag/gesetze

Thank you.

Abe's piece is definitely notable – many thanks.

The idea that law is a kind of code (in the CS sense) seemed like a pretty common idea to me... I remember various jokes revolving around that. I doubt anyone wrote those down, though ;)

My father, who is a lawyer on the brink of retirement with programming experience, mentioned this to me many times throughout his career.