INTERNATIONAL COPYRIGHT.
Learned americans, and the british writers applied in vain to congress
for a lawful protection of their honest labor. A subject of such
an importance as the International Copy-right, the truly, and best
pride of nations, had been neglected, in order to give place to long
speeches on dollars and cents, and on the presidential election. Had
rich booksellers prevented the senators from doing their duty; be it
ignorance, or neglect, it is what I cannot tell. But, a nation like
this, bound to protect the smallest invention of any mechanic (and I
feel happy to say that the most insignificant mechanic is protected)
that honorable senate has done nothing for the protection of an
american Milton, or an american Hume. How can America keep up with the
mind’s improvements of the other nations, the aurora of civil society,
the moral national power, when the creators of new thoughts, and the
historians of man’s deeds, are not protected?
Though the printer, or bookseller, cannot have any work, nor business,
without the writer, there is, perhaps, no other profession on earth
so much dependent to another, as the writer to the printer, and
bookseller. Each must live with his own labor; but, as the writer
cannot live with his own productions, unless protected by law,
legislators are bound to protect the writers of two nations, speaking
the same language. Such writers are the children of both nations. It
is not a tariff protection; it is a law which must needs prevent the
printer, or the bookseller, from pocketing the money, lawfully due to
the poor, honest writer.
There have been some writers who said, that genius will always carve
its way, though its country be a bad step-dame!--Indeed, we have
biographies of many geniuses, by which we see that they lived with
bread, and water all their life, and sometimes, by want of bread,
they did pass shivering days, and nights in garrets, with unfinished
poems, superior to that of Milton. True, a small part of those poor
geniuses, at the end of their painful life, they did find a protector.
But, many of them, who would have been the glory of their nation, did
they not die on the straw? Many, who with their arts would have lifted
up to heaven the mind of their contemporaries, finding themselves
neglected, they turned their geniuses to the fashion of a coat, or
a bonnet, the only means of getting a better living among citizens
who think more of fashion, than of the culture of their mind. Do we
not see, even literary periodicals inculcating the most extravagant
fashions with which many a father of large families had been ruined?
However, there are still many ladies, whose educated mind, permitting
them to discriminate their faces in the mirror of truth, with them,
intelligence is found to be the best ornament, than useless gaudy
dresses; and we are happy to say that, their neat, simple, modest
fashion cheers our heart.
I do agree with the above mentioned writers, that sometimes, though
too seldom, the genius carves its way, despite of its bad step-dame.
Still, we are forced to acknowledge, that many american children, born
to nobilitate this soil of their affection, are driven to unworthy
occupations, because a few misguided citizens, with a misunderstood
interest for themselves, wish to have no International Copy-right. And
for what reason?--Because they want cheap books! It was with a painful
feeling, I had been obliged to listen to erroneous, immoral speeches
contrary to an International Copy-right. They said that this republic
must not care of the ruin of few publishers, or authors, when the
plurality is benefitted by it; which is to say, the benefit of buying
books cheaper than their real value! Fine christians, indeed! Such a
doctrine, though not exactly the same, it sounds to my ears, as nearly
as inducing the poor people to steal from the rich, and get with it,
all that which they want. It should be better you would print no moral
books, and leave these citizens to follow the simple, and just dictates
of Nature, never failing to teach us good morals, than to place them in
the situation of buying moral books, with like immoral principles. To
go to church, or to read a moral book, it is not enough; we must act
accordingly. If a father finds in the library of his son one single
book, the edition of which was the ruin of its publisher, or its
author, his son could not have the feeling of a gentlemen at the time
he bought it, for the less of its value. Are they not all the books in
his son’s library, printed with the purpose of making him a gentleman?
And what kind of stuff are the tears dropping on the book of a sensible
writer, if the reader leaves the writer, or the publisher of it, dying
in want? Were they not, all the sciences, and arts, aiming to form us
better, I would never place my sight on one single page. We should not
imitate certain booksellers who, by dint of selling so much morals,
they have even sold the little one they had, before they entered into
like business. The moral man does not permit one single citizen to
suffer, if he can prevent it, nor would he take the advantage to the
least detriment of another, be he rich or poor. ‘The law of my country
sustains me, who am wrong,’ should say the honest man; ‘but, I find
that my opponent is right. So, in spite of this bad law, I will never
take such a cowardly advantage.’ What is it to me, my neighbor’s belief
in Christ, if with a bad law, such a christian takes from me the means
of my living, or he does not permit me to live with my mind’s labor?
The errata of present hurried editions, issued now a days, not being
revised by the british authors, are so many, that the proprietors of
their own works feel more displeased of losing thus, their reputation
as writers, than that of finding themselves deprived of the due
contribution, we ought justly pay them. Nay, were it to our shame, let
us tell the truth. Many american citizens were ruined by not having
been able to sell their own editions, when another publisher, after
having printed the same work, sold it at a loss, by which the edition
of the formers could not find any market.
Where writers, publishers, and booksellers do not sustain each other,
one of the three may have a direct, immediate interest in doing so,
during a little time; but, at the end of the business, as it is
generally with every speculator, who attempts to enrich himself with
the tears of his neighbor, he will, at last, find himself grasping
at the wind. It is a rule of nature: where one does not sustain the
other, the whole must give way. Murray in making a fortune to Byron
made still a greater fortune for himself. When Voltaire saw that the
blind direct interest of publishers, and booksellers created discord,
and misunderstanding, he kept printers in his own house for his own
books; and these were sold under his own direction. Would it not be
more agreeable, and more profitable to a publisher who, after having
paid the just remuneration for the manuscript to its author, who
lucubrated with a moral work, in order to sustain his family, would it
not be more profitable, I say, to the publisher, were he printing such
a work with leisure, which would do honor to his profession? Would it
not be more satisfactory to him in thinking that he may go to sleep
quietly, without fearing any republication of his own work? Besides,
we have rather too many new works: and the printing goes so fast now,
that we cannot read all, which comes out daily. It is better to read a
few pages with discrimination, and attention, than a whole library in
a steamboat. And the less we will read, if we judge by ourselves, the
more profitable it will be to us.
There is another kind of soft reasoners, who, finding that the british
living writers are, by far, superior in number to the americans,
they wish to appropriate the mind’s property of that nation on the
other side of the Atlantic. Thus, like pirates, as far as we can
steal through like sea, we must spare neither force, nor cunning, in
order to appropriate what does not belong to us!--Not only with like
sentiments we will never prosper; I am afraid we are bringing down
the glorious work of this country’s fathers, unless we give to Peter,
what does belong to Peter: and the morals I am here preaching, it is
not a matter of tariff. You may pay the duty of imported printed books
as much as you please. The morals which I am speaking of, it is to
prevent the printer, or the bookseller, from stealing the manuscript’s
right of the author, be this british, or american. I am here preaching
from preventing the mischief of placing the american writers in the
some jeopardy as the british writers are, respecting the american
publishers. Do you not know that the manuscript of an author is an
exclusive property? Do you not know that the comparison you made of
a manuscript with a bushel of corn, is the most absurd comparison?
You may buy as many bushels as you please of corn, and sow it in your
own ground, and every one who has land can do it: and after a year
of hard labor, nobody will grudge your profit. And in so doing, the
farmer, from whom you bought the corn, had done before you exactly the
same, and for which he should have no better preference than you. The
production of nature is a providence, and a blessing to us all: but,
the production of man, if not protected by law, it is a curse to man.
The work of a writer is a seed (since you call it a seed) entirely
different from all nature’s seeds. And had that genius never written
such a production, the printer could never put his machine at work with
which he should have no other right but to receive a lawful reward for
his labor, at the time it should not be permitted him to pocket the
writer’s reward also. Because in a few days he can overflow the whole
country with as many copies as he pleases of a writer’s work, who
spent ten years in writing it, shall we permit the printer to do it
with impunity? And because I have learned how to take your money out
of your pocket, and you cannot perceive when I do it, will you permit
me to steal your money? The corn comparison against the International
Copy-right, which I read in some newspapers, is a laming comparison.
We have all the same right on a seed of nature. A manuscript is as
good property to the writer, as an original machine to its inventor.
A book is a work of new ideas, originated from man’s mind, and not a
seed. A poor writer (and men of genius are generally poor) would never
attempt to write, if the rich printer only, is there to receive the
whole benefit of his own invention. Corn is corn; and a manuscript is
a manuscript. An ignorant is but an ignorant; but, a sophist is an
immoral man. That any one differing from me is an ignorant, a sophist,
or a more enlightened individual than I; it is not for me to decide.
My object, is to find out, here, the truth of this important argument,
and not to offend those who do not, wish not, or cannot agree with me.
Nothing, it seems to me, is more preposterous, than that, which we have
read by persons contrary to the interest of american writers, though, I
suppose, many of them may be honest, with all their singular views on
the subject.
This country is now inundated with trashes mixed of few good works:
and the people are so much enticed to buy the yet moist works from
the press, for which the standards of the libraries are neglected. On
entering a store, the first question, which a customer asks now of a
bookseller, it is for pamphlets just come out of the press. ‘We heard,’
they say, ‘that Johnson, Addison, Pope, and thousand others we have not
read, are fine and clever writers: but our days are going ahead; and
were we reading the old books, we would be left behind this rolling
railroad.’ Thus, the reading time, which should be spent with classical
works, and of taste, it is generally given to trifling books. I saw
persons reading poor descriptions of sceneries from France or Italy,
while they were running by steam, through the most beautiful sceneries
of America--american sceneries which they had never seen before! Such
kind of readers, I am inclined to believe, read more for fashion, than
for the purpose of instruction. Have we no standard works to peruse,
even such trifling things would be better than nothing, since I have
not read the most trifling book, without deriving some instruction
from it. But, if we can improve our taste by looking at, and studying
the pictures of Guido, Leonardo da Vinci, Albert Durer, Hans Holbein,
or Hogarth; why will we spend our precious time in looking at poor
pictures, or reading through very little sense?
The law of the International Copy-right, is a law of this century.
Before the colonization of America, every nation having her language,
quite different from the others, writers wanted no other protection but
the Copy-right of their own country. It is not so now between England,
and the United States. The two nations have the same language; and the
worthy writers, now benefiting the two nations with their productions,
must be protected by unanimous consent of the two nations. It is with
a sorrowful mind we are now forced to witness the american government,
a government from which we expect to derive more justice than from any
other government in the world, sustaining, and countenancing such a
piratical transaction. England, without boasting any republican law,
is more republican than we, upon this point of justice. Had the people
of America granted the just request of the british authors, trusted
long ago into the hands of Mr. Henry Clay, at this very time, as men
of genius are not wanted in America, despite of cavilers, writing
exaggerations against America, from the other side of the Atlantic, we
could now reckon american Byrons, and writers of all arts, and sciences
as good as any of the most civilized part of Europe.
The sooner we will stop the mischief to the detriment of american,
and british writers, the sooner we will see the aurora, and the glory
of American Literature. If great writers had been neglected in their
own country, at the time they had no nation of the same language
contending with them; how can we expect that a new american Milton,
will be appreciated, or known, without an international law with which
to protect the writer? Modest writers have many other difficulties to
get popularity, without this great one: and even learned persons are
meanly jealous of the fame of a new writer! Such examples which we have
in the republic of letters, are the shame of belles letters! Walter
Scott himself was unjust in writing against the first productions of
Byron. Had Addison never written a criticism on the Paradise Lost,
perhaps Milton himself might be yet unknown, such is the ignorance in
judging of great writers. The plurality, apes the great critics. Where
publishers can reprint the new works of another nation, without paying
for the manuscript, though they may give a little remuneration to their
country’s writers of an acquired reputation, they almost always decline
from giving any thing to an unknown genius. And can all the booksellers
judge of a writer’s merit? The International Copy-right between two
nations is as necessary as the Copy-right between the writer, and the
publisher of the same nation. The man of genius being a mere child
in business, he will always be the victim of the wily book merchant,
though there are gentlemen among all professions. Besides, when we will
be a little more civilized, it will not be, even, permitted to re-print
french, or italian works here, printed in France or Italy, without the
consent of the respective foreign writers.
The americans so susceptible (and better so, since susceptibility is a
sign of nice feeling) when travelers write, or speak of them, will they
neglect the glory of their National Literature, the best and greatest
glory of nations?