ceeding here and there. It is only in that way that he comes to know, through the American journals, that there is such a book.

Secondly, as a rule he will find the American edition better suited for his requirements, particularly in the matter of the binding, than is the foreign edition.

Thirdly, in the great majority of cases where the book is printed here it does not hold for imported books-the American edition is offered to him at a lower price.

It is to the advantage of the American book buyer, and next to the author it is to his interest, if you gentlemen should, of course, primarily consider that the books should, whenever there is demand enough to warrant, be produced in an American edition, that demand, I would say, should be 2,000 copies. If the demand does not reach 2,000 copies, the book would have to be imported, and under the present conditions it is imported and the copyright is forfeited. Under the bill as here proposed the English publisher has not only the control of his own market absolutely-there can be no importation into Great Britain of a work, whether by an English or by an American author which has secured British copyright, and the British copyright of which is in the control of an American publisher. Mr. BLOOM. Mr. Chairman, I wish Mr. Reid would remain silent for a moment, and allow me to ask Mr. Putnam one question.

Mr. HAMMER. I do not see the necessity of any one asking the question over another.

Mr. BLOOM. I ask the privilege for everyone.

Mr. REID. I am in favor of opening it up, if that is what you want to do.

Mr. HAMMER. When we make an agreement for everyone to wait until the witness gets through, I think we should adhere to the rule. Mr. BLOOM. I have made no such agreement. I do not know whether any agreement was made prior to my coming here, but the idea is this, there has been an awful lot of talk. If I could ask one question

Mr. REID. I object to his asking a question, unless I may ask one of mine.

Mr. HAMMER. You can not get anywhere, Mr. Chairman, when you permit one member of the committee to break the rule.

Mr. BLOOM. I do not see why any member has a right to make a rule for me. The chairman is supposed to decide what rules have been made, and if the chairman says I have a right, who has a right to say "no"?

Mr. HAMMER. If the chairman has the right to break the rule we entered into, that is another thing. But I am opposed to breaking any rules.

Mr. BLOOM. Let me tell you something, please.

Mr. REID. You Democrats can never agree. Go to it.

Mr. BLOOM. I just want to say this, Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, if I can get one answer from Mr. Putnam, I would think that we can right a great deal of this talk we are putting into the record.

Mr. REID. That is egotism, if you think you can do it by one question. I object to it, unless you are going to open it up to every

one.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Putnam, please finish your statement..

Mr. PUTNAM. I was attempting to say that all the American publishers want is equality of treatment as compared with English competitors. The English publisher has the right to place copies of his edition in the market, even though the copyright of the book has been purchased by the American publisher. The American publisher can not get a single copy into the English market of a book by an American author the copyright of which has been purchased by an English publisher.

I have a great batch of documents which I can not trouble you with containing evidence on that point, consisting of customs regulations and letters from librarians and publishers. I will make quotation from one letter by the librarian of the great London Library, C. Wright [reading]:

No librarians are allowed to import single copies of French pirated editions or any works pirated or others which infringe the British copyright laws, nor do they circulate these books. Apparently American librarians enjoy a privilege which English librarians do not possess.

But that is borne out by a whole batch of evidence which I can put before you gentlemen in writing later, and which I shall not take your time for here.

This is an exceptional provision that has been maintained with increasing injustice and serious interference with the interests of American book manufacturers and of American publishers; a serious interference with the interests of American readers, because the American publishers have been discouraged from making investments in books planned particularly for libraries, and that is an undesirable result for the community.

The English publisher is given the opportunity here of placing in the American market the English edition of books in which he has retained or purchased the copyright.

The American publisher purchasing in competition as many copyrights as he can get ahold of only has the partial control of that market. The invasion is increasing. I have spoken of the systematic flooding of the market here with circulars of the English agents who want to supply and who have a right to supply copies of the English editions. The London agents are building up business in this way.

Now, that interferes also with the manufacturing interests of this country. Speaking as a principal, as well as publisher-and this statement of mine is coming to an end, Mr. Chairman-we want to make, and under the manufacturing clause we have been permitted to make, the editions in this country of all books that secured American copyright.

I am in favor of getting into the convention of Berne, although the acceptance by the United States of the convention of Berne would constitute a very serious competition with and interference with American business. But I do not think, as a matter of civilization, that we should stay out. If we come into the convention of Berne, the English publishers will naturally control a larger number of English authors than they do a present. Under present conditions the English authors come the to American publishers only because they have to have their books manufactured here. You take away that manufacturing requirement and the English publishers will retain in their hands a very much larger proportion of the control of the works of English authors. However, we have got to stand that.

The only thing that we ask you gentlemen to do is at least to leave us the control of this market for the English authors whose copyrights we have bought. We contend that you ought not to put into an American statute a provision which constitutes an absolute injustice, the giving to English publishers a larger control of this market than comes to the American publisher under the statute, a control that is not permitted in Great Britain for us, an opportunity of invasion, nor in any copyright country in the world.

All the copyright statutes use the same term "exclusive rights" to the author. If the author has exclusive right, he can assign that exclusive right; if he has not the exclusive right to assign, he can get less for his rights; and the man who purchases a partial right and invests money in it increasingly loses his investment.

The bill as here proposed tends to discourage American publishing investment; to do an injustice to English authors, because it does not put them on the same basis with American authors as our reciprocity agreement of 1891 promised to do and as the regulations of Berne understands that we are to do; discourages investments by American publishers in books that the American public wants; throws an increasing proportion of the market into the hands of editions printed abroad, which we can not help when the English publisher owns the copyright, but which we should be able to help when the American publisher has made the investment in that copyright.

We ask you gentlemen to give us protection for these investments. We have worded here regulations which give to the librarian what he has a right to have, the privilege of importing foreign copiescopies of foreign editions, when he finds that more convenient for his purpose.

That is precisely the right that he now has for the foreign edition of the American book, all of which is clearly consistent with copyright. We only ask two editions, American and English. It gives to the individual the right to import foreign editions, if he prefers, but he has got to place the order for importation for the foreign edition of the English, just as he now has to place it for the foreign edition of the American book. This distinction which has been attempted here in this measure, and which exists in the present statute between the English and the American book is contrary to the whole principles of copyright itself, and it is particularly contrary to and inconsistent with the theories of international copyright of the Berne Convention, in which we are to accept membership.

Mr. BLOOM. May I ask if that amendment is offered in lieu of the bill?

Mr. PUTNAM. It is an amendment to equalize section 41. We have not undertaken to go into the other provisions of the bill.

Mr. LANHAM. It indicates what you want stricken out and what you want inserted in lieu thereof?

Mr. PUTNAM. Exactly. The gentlemen who are responsible for this framing, Mr. Solberg and his advisers, show just where this framing should come in.

Mr. BLOOM. I was thinking only of the excuse that you bring into your paper here if the United States would enter into the International Copyright Union, notwithstanding the fact that at the close of your statement you were sort of half-hearted.

Mr. PUTNAM. I am sorry

Mr. BLOOM. You were semienthusiastic over the fact that we are going to enter into or might enter into the International Copyright Union. Now, if the United States should enter into the International Copyright Union would not that fact solve about 90 per cent of your objections to the whole thing?

Mr. PUTNAM. No, sir; it would bring increased competition to the publishers, which they are prepared to accept, because the English edition, which can not be now sold of copyright books, could be sold. But my main objection, if you will allow me to finish the sentence, is that they do not leave in our law what is in the English law as a member of the Berne convention, the right of the purchaser of the copyright-the right of the author to assign the complete American right of the purchaser of the copyright to control that market.

Mr. BLOOM. You are then holding more of a brief for the English author than you are for the American author?

Mr. PUTNAM. No, sir; I am holding a brief for the authors on both sides.

Mr. BLOOM. I know, but we are talking about trying to make a law for the authors of the United States.

Mr. REID. No; you are not.

Mr. BLOOM. I am not talking to you. I will ask you a couple of questions.

Mr. REID. And you will get from me a couple of answers.

Mr. PUTNAM. I agree that the first party in interest is the English author, to whom in 1891 we promised reciprocity rights in this country which he has never had. But, secondly, to the American book buyer, who has the right to see the production and distribution of literature furthered, which it can not be if the business of the publishers is undermined.

Mr. BLOOM. But we are here trying to pass a copyright bill for the protection of the American author and composer; is not that right? Mr. PUTNAM. In connection with international obligations, sir. Mr. BLOOM. That is in this bill, is it not?

Mr. PUTNAM. Only partly. It is inconsistent in that bill.

Mr. BLOOM. But it is in the bill?

Mr. PUTNAM. In the first part of it, though taken away in the middle of it.

Mr. BLOOM. But it is in the bill?

Mr. PUTNAM. That is the purpose stated in the bill, but the bill does not state it.

Mr. BLOOM. Then if we take this bill, we will eliminate a great deal of the evil that you mention in your reading there, except the one fact that we are not giving enough protection to the English author; is not that the idea?

Mr. PUTNAM. No, sir; we do not ask for protection. You are not giving justice to the American publisher, who is expected to make an investment for the production and distribution of literature. You are undermining American publishers to the advantage of English publishers and English book manufacturers. That is contrary to the interests of printers, binders, and distributers of books, and it is contrary to the interests of American readers of books. The American author is concerned only indirectly, that if the interests of his publishers are undermined he will in the end be the loser himself.

Mr. BLOOM. What is the percentage of your writers as to being American and English that you publish for?

Mr. PUTNAM. Probably about one-third English and two-thirds American. My house is the oldest publishing house that has done business in England and is now the oldest publishing house in the United States under the same name and partnership.

Mr. BLOOM. What is the percentage of output which that onethird represents of 100 per cent?

Mr. PUTNAM. Well, as near as I could give it, it would be roughly about the same would not be very much different, excepting that the educational books might swell the American end of it, sir.

Mr. BLOOM. In other words, one-third of it is British and twothirds of it American according to that?

Mr. PUTNAM. About one-third in value and two-thirds in value. Mr. BLOOM. I am talking dollars.

Mr. PUTNAM. Both in bulk and in dollars and cents, I think it would be about the same. But the whole theory of the present literature production is to make it international. All we ask for in this market is equality of competition.

Mr. BLOOM. You have appeared before the committee several times. Have you always opposed or made the same statement with reference to the entrance into the International Copyright Union?

Mr. PUTNAM. I have always advocated coming into the International Union, sir; and the bills that we got through in 1891-and I may say I had a large responsibility in that; I fought for them for six years. We took the best that we could get. Our friends, the printers, then thought it was essential to have the manufacturing clause in it, and we accepted the manufacturing clause.

But I came to Washington representing the Copyright League, I think it was in 1886, to get our country into the convention of Berne, and I have been fighting for that ever since.

Mr. BLOOM. Would you mind giving to the committee sometime a statement of the volume of business that your firm does with reference to English and American authors?

Mr. PUTNAM. I will get the figures. There is no objection. We do not usually give away trade statistics, but I have no objection. Mr. BLOOм. You will pardon me, but you made certain statements that I would like to get clear.

Mr. PUTNAM. Yes, sir.

Mr. BLOOM. Is there anything else in this bill, outside of that section 41, that you object to?

Mr. PUTNAM. The right to assign markets: The bill pretends to give and then, as I pointed out, did not give that part clearly.

Mr. BLOOM. You would not object to the United States entering into the International Copyright Union?

Mr. PUTNAM. On the contrary, I have been a fighter for that; I have been to every copyright conference in Europe as the representative of the American publishers fighting for that thing. I am not one of the opponents of it at all.

Mr. BLOOM. Your witness, Mr. Reid.

Mr. HAMMER. One minute, if you do not mind: Would not your suggestion as to the changes you desire to make in the law require 30335-251- -3