Fox Film Corporation v. Knowles
| Decision Date | 12 March 1923 |
| Docket Number | Nos. 310 and 311,s. 310 and 311 |
| Citation | 261 U.S. 326,67 L.Ed. 680,43 S.Ct. 365 |
| Parties | FOX FILM CORPORATION v. KNOWLES et al. (two cases) |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Messrs. Alfred A. Wheat and Saul E. Rogers, both of New York City, and William J. Hughes, of Washington, D. C., for petitioner.
Mr. Louis R. Bick, of Brooklyn, N. Y., for respondents.
[Argument of Counsel from page 327 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice HOLMES delivered the opinion of the Court.
These are bills in equity brought by the petitioner to restrain dramatic performances based upon two poems, 'Over the Hills to the Poor House' and 'Over the Hills from the Poor House,' and for an account and damages. The author of the poems, Will Carlton, held a renewed copyright for them which ex ired on or about February 21, 1915. He died on December 18, 1912, testate, leaving all his property to Norman E. Goodrich and appointing him sole executor. On January 21, 1915, the executor applied for and obtained a renewal of the copyright to February 21, 1929. Later the exclusive right to dramatize the poems was assigned to the plaintiff. The only defense relied upon here is that the statutes did not give the executor a right of renewal and that therefore the copyright has expired. The bills were dismissed upon this ground by the District Court, (No. 310) 274 Fed. 731; (No. 311) 275 Fed. 582; and the decrees were affirmed on the authority of Silverman v. Sunrise Pictures Corporation, 273 Fed. 909, 19 A. L. R. 289, by the Circuit Court of Appeals. 279 Fed. 1018.
This copyright was subsisting when the Copyright Act of March 4, 1909, c. 320, 35 Stat. 1075 (Comp. St. § 9517 et seq.), went into effect. By section 24 of that statute (Comp. St. § 9545) copyrights so subsisting 'may, at the expiration of the term provided for under existing law, be renewed and extended by the author of such work if still living, or the widow, widower, or children of the author, if the author be not living, or if such author, widow, widower, or children be not living, then by the author's executors, or in the absence of a will, his next of kin, for a further period such that the entire term shall be equal to that secured by this Act, including the renewal period: * * * Provided, that application for such renewal and extension shall be made to the copyright office and duly registered therein within one year prior to the expiration of the existing term.' The argument on which the statute was held not to apply to the present case was that the renewal creates a new estate, White-Smith Music Pub. Co. v. Goff, 187 Fed. 247, 109 C. C. A. 187; that the estate is purely statutory, and does not exist until within one year prior to the expiring of the existing term; that therefore Carlton dying more than a year before that moment had nothing to bequeath; and that the statute gave nothing to the executor except when the testator had the right to renew at the moment of his decease. It is argued that the executor is mentioned only to provide for the case of the testator's dying within the year without having exercised his...
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M. Witmark & Sons v. Fred Fisher Music Co.
...the widow, children, executors, or next of kin, in the event of Graff's death prior to the renewal period. See Fox Film Corp. v. Knowles, 261 U.S. 326, 43 S.Ct. 365, 67 L.Ed. 680. The only contested point is whether or not the statute absolutely forbids assignment. Certainly the passage doe......
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Estate of Burne Hogarth v. Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc.
...claim on the ground that "only [the artist's] executor could legally obtain a renewal." Id. at 32 (citing Fox Film Corp. v. Knowles, 261 U.S. 326, 43 S.Ct. 365, 67 L.Ed. 680 (1923)). Presumably, if we had regarded the mural as a work for hire, the commissioning party would have been deemed ......
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Penn v. Robertson
...in this respect, and we do not consider it sound. Executors are personal representatives of a decedent (Fox Film Corp. v. Knowles, 261 U.S. 326, 43 S.Ct. 365, 67 L. Ed. 680; 23 C.J. 1170) and have the power to act for him in determining, in accordance with law, what constitutes assets of th......
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Rohauer v. Killiam Shows, Inc.
...we do not find that any of the Supreme Court decisions discussed at length in the briefs, primarily Fox Film Corporation v. Knowles, 261 U.S. 326, 43 S.Ct. 365, 67 L.Ed. 680 (1923); Fred Fisher Music Co. v. M. Witmark & Sons, 318 U.S. 643, 63 S.Ct. 773, 87 L.Ed. 1055 (1943); De Sylva v. Bal......