The Copyright Question A Letter to the Toronto Board of Trade

Excerpt

The Copyright Question

TORONTO, FEBRUARY 19, 1902

The Secretary,
The Board of Trade,
Toronto

SIR—

The Council of the Board of Trade lately adopted a resolution asking that Canadian Legislation be passed, giving effect to the Copyright Bill proposed in 1895 by Mr. Hall Caine, "making it obligatory that a book shall be printed and bound in this country in order to secure Canadian copyright, and continue to be so printed and bound in order to retain such copyright, and that upon failure to print in Canada within a reasonable time, provision shall be made by which the Government may issue to a Canadian publisher a license to print in Canada, subject to such safeguards as will secure to the owner of such book a reasonable royalty upon his work." The resolution is to be forwarded to the Boards of Trade of other cities in Canada, together with the request that they join in representations to the Government asking their consideration of this important question, and urging the passing of this legislation.

This resolution emanated from the Wholesale Booksellers' Section of the Board of Trade, of which Mr. W.J. Gage is the Chairman. The Report of this Section presented to the Board recites, that in 1895 Mr. Hall Caine came to this country, the duly accredited representative of English authors, accompanied by Mr. Daldy, representing the English publishers, and that after a conference with Canadian publishers, papermakers, printers and bookbinders, a draft Bill was completed, which Mr. Hall Caine announced to the Canadian Government as containing an understanding reached with the Canadian publishers, and to which Mr. Daldy, on behalf of the English publishers, consented. These statements were made in the Report of the Section, notwithstanding the fact that at a Committee meeting composed of its members held last year, I read a letter from the Secretary of the British Society of Authors stating that Mr. Hall Caine's proposed Bill had never received the approval of the Society; and although at the same meeting I stated that Mr. Daldy had informed me he had never consented to the Bill. After the Report of the action of the Board of Trade reached England, Mr. Daldy addressed a letter to "The Publishers' Circular," from which I quote:—

"So far from consenting to it (i.e., the Hall Caine Bill), I pointed out several important errors to which I could not agree; and being invited by some printers, publishers, and papermakers to meet them in Toronto just afterwards, I distinctly assured them that I could not consent to any restriction of the rights and privileges contained in the Imperial Acts of 1842 and 1886."

I was absent from Toronto when the Booksellers' Section framed and passed its Report, and only returned to Toronto after it had been adopted at the meeting of the Council of the Board. Knowing that the Council was being misled, I communicated with the President and requested that I might be heard before the Council, offering to explain the copyright question, which I knew was little understood by the members, of whom only two or three are publishers....