- SOME QUESTIONS OF COPYRIGHT.
THE La* of Copyright Committee, appointed last JL March to consider the Copyright Convention signed at Berlin on November 13th, 1908, have now issued their Report. It is in some respects a singular document. The Committee have had to examine questions which, perhaps, would have considerably astonished the House of Commons before whom Macaulay made his great copyright speeches ; and possibly, under the changed conditions of to-day, Macaulay himself would have found reason for agreeing with the Committee's conclusions. They are certainly very different from his own. Briefly stated, the chief questions which the Committee had to consider were those of copyright in books, in lectures and speeches, in architecture, in music, and, in particular, the adaptation of musical works to instruments which can produce them mechanically,—a difficult problem which only the last decade has made it necessary to solve. It cannot be said that the Committee have discovered a complete solution for this or for other difficulties, but they provide, at least, in their recommendations a basis on which to work.
To authors, no doubt, the most important of the Committee's expressions of opinion is that the term of copyright should. be lengthened. At present it stands at forty-two years, or seven years from the death of the author, whichever period happens to be the longer. The Committee recommend that it should be fixed at fifty years from the author's death in every case, and in the altered circumstances of the day that is certainly a juster way of treating an author's property than the existing law. That is easily seen by a reference to the very arguments used by Macaulay in opposition to the Bill brought in by Mr. Serjeant Talfourd in 1841, the object of the Bill being to extend the period of copyright in a book to sixty years, reckoned from the death of the writer. Macaulay's main argument was that the extension of the period of copy- right led to books being difficult to get and dear to buy, and that the longest period of copyright did not necessarily bring about the end aimed at by the promoters of the Bill, which was the protection and enrichment of the author's descendants. He took as instances from which to argue his point the cases of Dr. Johnson and Milton's granddaughter. Dr. Johnson, he said, died fifty-six years ago. If the law were what the Bill proposed. to make it, somebody would. be in possession of a monopoly of Dr. Johnson's works. Probably that somebody would be a bookseller. As a result, Dr. Johnson's works would be scarce and dear. But, the law being what it was, they were broadcast and cheap. " I can buy Rasselas ' for sixpence ; I might have had to give five shillings for it. I can buy the Dictionary, the entire genuine Dictionary, for two guineas, perhaps for less ; I might have had to give five or six guineas for it." And would Dr. Johnson be any the better off ? He would not, of course. Then take the case of Milton's granddaughter. Was she in any way benefited by the copyright of " Paradise Lost " being held by Jacob Tonson ? Every- body who wanted Milton's works must buy them at Tonson's shop and at Tonson's price, and she, the grand- daughter, meanwhile is reduced to destitution. " Milton's works are under a monopoly. Milton's granddaughter is starving. The reader is pillaged. ; but the writer's family is not enriched." All that is very forcible, but it is not an argument which affects the question to-day. In Macaulay's time books were far more expensive, and fewer were printed. Authors expected. to make their profits out of a small public, who paid very highly for the privilege of reading them. To-day the object aimed at is to obtain the widest public possible. The desire of publishers and authors alike is circulation, not limitation. Nor does Macaulay's argument meet the point that if Dr. Johnson had had a son to whom he wished to leave his property, or if Milton had controlled his copyright in the interests of his descendants, both would have felt that they were leaving more, and wished to leave more, behind them. It may not be every writer's desire to do that, but it is unquestionably . the legitimate desire of many. Writers who make their living by their pen are as anxious as lawyers or doctors or any business men to make provision for their families. Only a very few make large incomes ; but it may well be a consolation and an encouragement to others, trying to do the best work they can, to hope that posterity may judge them more highly than their contemporaries, and that they may be leaving for their children a source of income derived from their books,—the only capital they could collect in their lifetime. Macaulay spoke of Milton's descendant ; 'we are reminded of Dickens's granddaughters. When their names appeared. in the Civil List a short time ago, it 'must have seemed incongruous to many that editions of Dickens were still being bought for every schoolroom.
Other questions on which the Committee give their decision are much more complicated. One is as to the rights of " choreographic works and entertainments in dumb show which depend practically upon costume and get-up and dramatic action, which is not dialogue or music." Is there a grievance here sufficiently widespread to demand the interference of the law ? The wording would appear to include as a proper subject for copyright the particular method of this or that comedian in perform- ing the cake-walk ; but the objections to copying cake- walkers may be greater than they appear. A much more important point is raised in regard to architecture. The Committee have come to the decision that it is desirable to enlarge the existing law, which forbids the copying of architectural plans, so as to forbid also the copying of buildings. This is, on the face of it, difficult, and the Committee admit the difficulty. The object is " to protect works of original and artistic character," and though it may be hard to prove infringement, and damages might not be technically provable, " Ode does not affect the principle." Doubtless ; but can the principle be upheld ? And is the copying of buildings a sufficiently frequent grievance of architects to make it worth while to alter the law? It may possibly be so, but it does not seem probable. In any case, what of the proof of dishonest copying ? Suppose an architect builds a church, or a country house, or a bank, or a town hall in an " original and artistic " manner, and then another architect goes to another town and puts up a facade or a spire like the " original and artistic" one, how is he to be proved to have copied ? Who is to date his private sketch-books ? It would be the most difficult thing in the world to prove that he could not have arrived at his method of treatment by independent imagination. Possibly in more recent developments of town architecture in the management of shop windows, for instance, which is a matter that has occupied German architects of the highest standing—the onus of proof might be easier. Possibly in Berlin such designs have been unfairly copied. But if the same thing has happened often in London, we have heard very little about it.
We are rightly anxious to see that the law shall protect the original and abiding work of men who have created and imagined great things, and that they shall be able to transmit their property in their work, to a reasonable extent at least, to their descendants. It happens occasion- ally that they care very little about the matter themselves ; or that they are indifferent whether their life's work takes a tangible form, such as a book or a number of books. Take, for instance, the work of a journalist such as Frederick Greenwood, whose death we chronicled last week. He had books published, it is true, but his life's work was in writing and talking on questions of the day, and in inspiring others to write, and so, perhaps, to mould the history of his time. He leaves little that is tangible behind him in the printed pages of his own books ; but he is not absent, if he is unnamed, in the pages of the books of others. Like another inspiring figure, Dr. Sebastian Evans, whose death followed his so quickly, he lives still in the work of men who have come after him. It is a choice which all writers must make, of course, whether they will devote themselves to the journalism of the day or try for literature that is to last ; but it is not given to many journalists, as it was to these, to leave comparatively so little of their own written work in a tangible form behind them, and yet to have scored their character so deep in the minds and books of living men.
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