EDITOR'S TABLE. 



619 



a view of enforcing, incidentally, that 

 protection from the United States which 

 we accord to them. This might be 

 done by withdrawing from the Ameri- 

 cans the privilege of copyright on first 

 publication in this country. We have, 

 however, come to the conclusion that 

 it is advisable that our law should be 

 based on correct principles, irrespective 

 of the opinions or policy of other na- 

 tions. We admit the propriety of pro- 

 tecting copyright, and it appears to us 

 that the principle of copyright, if ad- 

 mitted, is one of universal application. 

 We, therefore, recommend that this 

 country should pursue the policy of 

 recognizing the author's rights, irre- 

 spective of nationality." 



On a subject which presents so much 

 that is conflicting and unsettled, it is 

 not to be supposed that there would be 

 complete unanimity of opinion among 

 the fifteen members of this commission, 

 who were chosen because they are men 

 of intelligence, and capable of forming 

 their own views. The subject, besides, 

 was one of great extent and complica- 

 tion of rival interests, involving the 

 policy to be pursued regarding home 

 and foreign copyrights, abridgments of 

 books, musical compositions, dramati- 

 zation of novels, lectures, newspapers, 

 paintings, photographs, translations, 

 registrations, forfeitures, infringements, 

 and scores of other matters hitherto 

 left to a chaotic system of legislation. 

 But, considering the task they had be- 

 fore them, the commissioners have come 

 to substantial agreement as to the meas- 

 ures recommended. There were two 

 or three wrong-headed and crotchety 

 men, who made dissenting reports on 

 various points, although concurring in 

 the main practical results. Chief among 

 these eccentric dissentients was Sir Lou- 

 is Mallet ; he could not agree with his 

 coadjutors, and with some of the lead- 

 ing gentlemen who testified before 

 them, as to the ground of rights in lit- 

 erary property. Many ingenious and 

 fanciful arguments have been made to 

 prove that men have no right to the 



property they create by brain-labor, or 

 have only such a qualified right to it 

 that to appropriate it without consent 

 is not stealing. What a man earns by 

 his hands, and by capital invested in 

 tools and machinery, they admit he has 

 a right to against the world ; but what 

 he earns by laborious thinking, and by 

 capital invested in education, may be 

 taken from him by anybody who wants 

 it. Many funny reasons, as we have 

 said, have been offered for allowing 

 those who can make anything by it for 

 themselves to plunder authors of the 

 products of their toil, but Sir Louis 

 Mallet has the honor of contributing 

 the last curious pretext for this sort of 

 robbery. He says: "The right con- 

 ferred by a copyright-law derives its 

 chief value from the discovery of the 

 art of printing; and there appears no 

 reason for giving to authors any larger 

 share in the value of a mechanical in- 

 vention, to which they have contributed 

 nothing, than to any other member of 

 the community." But, if authors are 

 not to be permitted to hold their prop- 

 erty because the discovery of the art 

 of printing has contributed to its value, 

 what right has anybody to hold any 

 property that is the result of an inven- 

 tion or discovery to which he has not 

 contributed ? The doctrine would make 

 sad havoc of the rights of capitalists and 

 laborers in all countries, whose earnings 

 and accumulations are due to the use of 

 steam-engines, telegraphs, spinning-ma- 

 chinery, and a thousand other devices 

 to which they have never contributed. 



Sir Louis Mallet coincides in the 

 practical recommendations of the re- 

 port, although not agreeing with the 

 grounds upon which they are made. 

 Yet he exhibited a good deal of ingen- 

 ious perverseness in embarrassing the 

 inquiry. This was well illustrated by 

 the case he undertook to make out 

 against the necessity of international 

 copyright by the success of the " Inter- 

 national Scientific Series," where for- 

 eign authors are paid without the com- 

 pulsion of an international copyright- 



