Universal Film Mfg. Co. v. Copperman

• Citation: 212 F. 301
• Parties: UNIVERSAL FILM MFG. CO. v. COPPERMAN et al.
• Decision Date: 01 March 1914
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

212 F. 301

UNIVERSAL FILM MFG. CO. v. COPPERMAN et al.

United States District Court, S.D. New York.

March, 1914

Isaac B. Owens, of New York City, for complainant.

Samuel F. Frank, of New York City, for defendants.

HOUGH District Judge.

Prior to September, 1912, the Nordisk Films Company manufactured or created a motion picture photo play known as 'The Great Circus Catastrophe.' The photographs on the film tell a story which was originally shown by human actors who played their parts before a camera, so that the photo play (i.e the story told by the photographs successively shown to the audience) is a pantomime drama. The Nordisk Company is a Danish corporation; this work was done in Denmark. In that and other countries of Europe it was in 1912 lawful to copyright photo plays, but no copyright was sought. Before September 7, 1912, the Nordisk Company advertised and sold this photo play 'for release on September 7th.' This means that they sold photographic prints, films, or reels from the original negative wherever they could, with the agreement, however, that no public exhibition should be had until September 7th. Purchasers of this photo play further agreed that it should not be exported or sold for export to any other country; that is to say, the right of presenting the drama or showing the pantomime was limited to the country wherein the sale took place. On November 14, 1912, the photo play was copyrighted in the United States, but in the preceding September one of the films was bought by one of the defendants in England without any knowledge of the restriction on its use inserted in the contract of sale between the Nordisk Company and the first purchaser. This film was brought to the United States and exhibited before copyright registration. The point for decision is whether this copyright is valid.

Prior to the present copyright statute (March 4, 1909) the lawful method of obtaining copyright was laid down in Rev. Stat Sec. 4956 (U.S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 3407), as amended from time to time. That section prescribed what had to be done not only in regard to copyrighting books and the like, but also such things as photographs, drawings, etc. Section 9 of the act of 1909 carries forward substantially the historic method of obtaining copyright and corresponds to Rev. Stat. Sec. 4956, when it says:

'Any person entitled thereto by this act may secure copyright for his work by publication thereof with the notice of copyright required by this act.'

Around this method of procuring copyright has grown a great body of case law, the sum of which is that publication with notice of copyright is the essence of compliance with the statute, and publication without such notice amounts to a dedication to the public sufficient to defeat all subsequent efforts at copyright protection.

It is here argued that the act of 1909 disturbed this theory of copyright and introduced another and new kind of copyright. This argument rests on the existence of section 11, which as originally passed in 1909, read as follows:

'Copyright may also be had of the works of an author of which copies are not reproduced for sale, by the deposit, with claim of copyright, of one complete copy of such work, if it be a lecture or similar production, or a dramatic or musical composition; of a photographic print if the work be a photograph; or of a photograph or other identifying reproduction thereof if it be a work of art or a plastic work or drawing.' The argument is that this section relates only to something 'of which copies are not reproduced for sale,' so that lectures, dramatic compositions, photographs, works of art, plastic works, and drawings may be copyrighted in two ways, and the proper way will depend upon whether copies thereof are or are not

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