Modern building codes began to appear following the great fires which consumed large areas of American cities during the nineteenth century. The codes in use today are not laws, and the code councils which compile them are not enforcement agencies. Building codes are models adopted, with local amendments, by city, county, and state governments. Formerly, there were three model codes, used in different sections of the country. The Building Officials and Code Administrators (BOCA) published the BOCA National Building Code, which was primarily followed in the north-central and northeastern states. The International Conference of Building Officials (ICBO) published the Uniform Building Code, used mostly west of the Mississippi. The Southern Building Code Congress published the SBCCI Standard Building Code, adopted primarily in southeastern states.
Beginning in the 1990s, efforts were made to standardize the various building codes. Editions of all codes published after the mid-1990s adopted the same format and organization. In 1994, the International Code Council was formed from representatives of the three building codes organizations to reconcile differences between the three regional codes. In 2000, the ICC published the International Building Code, which was adopted as the model construction code for most states. The 2006 revision of the International Building Code has been adopted as the model code for the entire United States.