The White Pine news. [volume] (Ely, Nev.) 1906-1910, 1907-07-01

| winter as well as III the summer.
Q. There are still others who are
pecuniarily. interested in the making
of books? Name them
A. At guess, about three thou.
| sand book compositors, earning 4
| wage of three million and a half dol
lars year.
@. Go on
A. Some hundreds of printing
pressmen and boys
@. Proceed.
A. Some hundreds or thousands
| of binders, paper makers and print
ing ink manufacturers.
@. Go on.
A. A score of illustrators, pho
tographers and engravefs.
@. Go on.
A. Some hundreds of box-makers
and packers, porters and employees
of the railways and express compan-
les
| @. You have footed up formida-
BILE army, Mr.. Clemens. Is there
anyone in the country who is not Pc
cuniarily interested in the making of
books?
| A. Yes; the ten thousand
| @. Let us now get back to the be-
ginning and add up results. Some
thousands of persons and their fam
flies are greatly and Importantly in
terested in the making of books;
you have granted that these thou
sands are all well protected by the
existing copyright law-protected be-
yond possibility of hurt; you have
conceded that all of the ten thousand
authors except the specialized TWEEN
ty-five are amply protected by the
law as it stands, because their books
will never live out the forty-two year
limit, and therefore could not be adj
vantaged by extending it. Now, then,
| wish to ask you serious question.
You have proven that in representing
the twenty-five you represent the
smallest interest, the poorest inter-
Fest, the most microscopic interest,
that has ever intruded itself upon
the attention of a legislative body in
this age or any other. This interest
has been intruding Beseeching, COM
planning persistently for two centur
les, in England and America, and in
that time have wasted the valuable
time of parliaments and congresses
time so valuable, SO precious, that If
you should reduce that value to dol
lars and cents, the aggregate would
amount to millions and millions of
dollars-and would build fifty battle
ships and equip for war a hundred
| thousand soldiers Mr. Clemens,
how do you excuse the continued and
persistent agitation of this matter?
A. excuse it for reasons thatSeem
to me to justify it. In the first place,
upon the grounds of our moral law
Our moral law endOws us with GER
tain rights; one of these Isl the right
to hold and enjoy, unchallenged and
unmolested, property created by our
honest and honorable industries; and
this endowment is not Disseminated,
but comes to us all alike, to all in
equal measure. 1t does not give
this property-right to the publisher,
butcher, landowner, corporation,
shoe maker and deny 1t to the author
1T includes the author. 1t is the
hight of every man-his right, and
not a benevolence conferred upon
him as charity by legislatures. The
moral law existed before copyright,
and in authority supercedes any
statute that can be inflicted by the
legislature. Legislatures can, by
force of arbitrary power, rob an au-
thor by statute, but no statute can
keep that statute from being crime.
1t is lawful crime, legalized crime,
like the atrOciOus crime legalized by
all Christian legislatures and indi-
Gated by the infamous phrase THE
age of consent" hut it remains a
crime just the same. The clause in
the constitution of the United States
which denied perpetual property to
an authors book is crime and an
excuser and defender and propagation
of crime, and the fact that it is part
of the constitution in no wise relieves
it from that stain, and from merited
contempt. / will venture yet an
other reason for not being in the
least ashamed to come here in the
interest of that grotesquely small
band-the twenty-five authors who
could be benefited by the requested
extension of the copyright limit tol
the life of the author and fifty years
after. 1t is this: Almost the
most prodigious asset - of al
country, and perhaps its most pre-
cious possession, is its native literary
product, when that product is fine
and noble and enduring. Whence
comes this enduring literature? 1t
comes from the twenty-five and
from no other source. In the course
of a century-and not in any briefer
time-the contemporaneous twenty