February 12, 1886.] 



SCIENCE. 



135 



try, is so far protected that no other publisher 

 than the one with whom the author has arranged 

 can bring it out. There is no such law, nor even 

 any such custom, in this country. But so great 

 an advantage has an American publisher over his 

 competitors, when by previous arrangement he is 

 enabled to bring out an American edition of an 

 English book simultaneously with its appearance 

 abroad, that he rarely hesitates to take the risk, 

 and he pays the English author or his representa- 

 tive well for this advantage of simultaneous pub- 

 lication. 



Now, what the Englishman is doing for us 

 under cover of a strong custom, and so far un- 

 disputed law, let us do for him under sanction of 

 a statute ; and the problem is so far solved that we 

 may safely leave all petty details to be adjusted by 

 the laws of trade between the two countries, and 

 the interests of the parties chiefly concerned. Si- 

 multaneous publication, then, in the two countries, 

 is the fairest w T ay out of our difficulties. It is so 

 far compulsory that it makes the best foreign 

 thought as immediately available in America as in 

 Europe. It compels the publisher and author not 

 to suit their own convenience, but to study the 

 demands of two continents ; and ' the progress of 

 science ' will receive- by such a course an impetus 

 which no method, planned for the advantage of 

 the author alone, or the publisher alone, or the 

 people alone, can possibly give. 



H. E. Scuddee. 



INTERNATIONAL COPYRIGHT. 



''The question of copyright, like most questions 

 of civil prudence, is neither black nor white, but 

 gray." So said Mr. Macaulay. Mr. Lowell says it 

 is a question of robbery; the American copyright 

 league, a question of piracy. Those who use these 

 epithets base their assertions upon the ground that 

 an author has a broader, more extensive right of 

 property in his publications than in other property. 

 That a man has property in the production of his 

 brain which ought to be protected is admitted ; but 

 the extent of that protection must depend upon the 

 public interest. 



Scruton, in his book entitled 4 Laws of literary 

 property,' published in 1883 in London, says, 

 " Utilitarianism is the groundwork of the science 

 and art of legislation, and therefore the reason 

 which justifies the enactment of any particular 

 law is the ultimate benefit to result to the commu- 

 nity from its conformity to such a law." This 

 claim of property in books, as made by Mr. Lowell 

 and the league, is of modern origin, and was not 

 made until the early part of the last century, long 

 after the introduction of printing, and is not recog- 



nized by any civilized government. Grants in the 

 nature of copyright were first made to printers, to 

 encourage the multiplication of books, and were 

 subsequently made for the benefit of the authors. 

 In England the courts have decided that, at com- 

 mon law, an author had no right of property in his 

 publications, and that whatever rights he has have 

 been created by statute law. 



Our constitution provides that congress shall 

 have power "to promote science and the useful 

 arts by securing for limited times to authors 

 and inventors the exclusive right to their re- 

 spective writings and discoveries." The powers 

 of congress are more limited than those of the par- 

 liament of Great Britain, which are not restricted 

 by any constitution; and many grants which in 

 England have been made 4 for the benefit of 

 authors,' would in this country have been uncon- 

 stitutional. Every copyright is a monopoly. This 

 proposition has been admitted by some of our 

 authors, but denied by others who were probably 

 ignorant of the meaning of the word. A monopoly 

 is ' an exclusive trading privilege : ' it is " the sole 

 right or power of selling something ; the full com- 

 mand over the sale of any thing; a grant from the 

 sovereign to some one individual, of the sole right 

 of making and selling some one commodity." 



Every monopoly must be construed strictly, and 

 should not be extended where reasonable doubt 

 exists against the right. If authors limited their 

 claims of property in the productions of their brains 

 to the manuscript or a printed copy, no one would 

 dispute their right to hold or lease or sell it ; but they 

 claim much more, — the monopoly of publication 

 and selling, the exclusive right of multiplying 

 copies everywhere and in every tongue and for ail 

 time, and they appeal to the government for aid in 

 enforcing this right. Every nation has repudi- 

 ated this claim as contrary to the interests of the 

 public, and granted only such limited rights as 

 it judged expedient. 



General Hawley, who introduced the bill favored 

 by the league, which gave the foreign author per- 

 mission to publish abroad or in this country, 

 realizing the weight of the objections made by the 

 publisher and printer, that it would result in 

 transferring the printing of all international copy- 

 righted books to foreign countries, proposed an 

 amendment to his bill, providing that every 

 foreign book copyrighted in this country should 

 be printed and published here. If the view 

 of the league is correct, this amendment robs 

 the foreign author of a part of his property 

 by depriving him of the privilege of selecting 

 the time or place of publication, or choosing his 

 publisher. The tendency of this amendment 

 would be to increase the cost of copyrighted books. 



