Business Law 13th Edition by Frank Cross, Kenneth Clarkson, Roger LeRoy Miller

تمرين 17

BACKGROUND AND FACTS?The United States joined the Berne Convention in 1989, but it failed to give foreign copyright holders the same protections enjoyed by U.S. authors. Contrary to the Berne Convention, the United States did not protect any foreign work that had already entered the public domain.
In 1994, Congress enacted the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (URAA), which "restored" copyright protection for many foreign works that were already in the public domain. The URAA put foreign and domestic works on the same footing, allowing their copyrights to extend for the same number of years. Lawrence Golan, along with a group of musicians, conductors, and publishers, filed a suit against Eric Holder, in his capacity as the U.S. attorney general. These individuals had enjoyed free access to foreign works in the public domain before the URAA's enactment. They claimed that the URAA violated the copyright clause of the U.S. Constitution and thus that Congress had exceeded its constitutional authority in passing the URAA.
A federal appellate court held that Congress did not violate the copyright clause by passing the URAA. The petitioners appealed. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari to resolve the matter.
IN THE LANGUAGE OF THE COURT
Justice GINSBURG delivered the opinion of the Court.
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* * * The Constitution states that "Congress shall have Power... to promote the Progress of Science... by securing for limited Times to Authors... the exclusive Right to their... Writings." Petitioners [Golan and others] find in this grant of authority an impenetrable [impassable] barrier to the extension of copyright protection to authors whose writings, for whatever reason, are in the public domain. We see no such barrier in the text of the Copyright Clause
* * *. * * * * The text of the Copyright Clause does not exclude application of copyright protection to works in the public domain. * * * Petitioners' contrary argument relies primarily on the Constitution's confinement of a copyright's lifespan to a "limited Tim[e]." "Removing works from the public domain," they contend, "violates the 'limited times' restriction by turning a fixed and predictable period into one that can be reset or resurrected at any time, even after it expires." Our decision in [a prior case] is largely dispositive [capable of settling a dispute] of petitioners' limited-time argument.a There we addressed the question of whether Congress violated the Copyright Clause when it extended, by 20 years, the terms of existing copyrights. Ruling that Congress acted within constitutional bounds, we declined to infer from the text of the Copyright Clause "the command that a time prescription, once set, becomes forever 'fixed' or 'inalterable.'" "The word 'limited,' we observed, "does not convey a meaning so constricted." Rather, the term is best understood to mean "confine[d] within certain bounds," "restrain[ed]," or "circumscribed." The construction petitioners tender closely resembles the definition rejected in Eldred [the prior case] and is similarly infirm [weak]. [Emphasis added.]
* * * * * * * In aligning the United States with other nations bound by the Berne Convention, and thereby according equitable treatment to once disfavored foreign authors, Congress can hardly be charged with a design to move stealthily toward a regime of perpetual copyrights.
DECISION AND REMEDY?The United States Supreme Court affirmed the federal appellate court's ruling that the URAA does not violate the U.S. Constitution's copyright clause. Thus, Golan and the others could no longer use, without permission, any of the foreign works that were previously in the public domain. By passing the URAA in the United States, Congress, in effect, took those works out of the public domain and extended copyright protection to them. Henceforth, U.S. copyright and patent laws cover all such foreign intellectual property.
THE GLOBAL DIMENSION?What does the Court's decision in this case mean for copyright holders in the United States who want copyright protection in other countries? Will other nations be more or less inclined to protect U.S. authors? Explain.
The Economic Dimension Why did a group of musicians, conductors, publishers, and others file this suit? What did they hope to gain by a decision in their favor?