An Act to amend title 17, United States Code, entitled ""Copyrights""
PL 83-743 (H.R.6616), enacted 08/31/1954

1030 
Un c ompensated 
personnel. 
Appointments 
and expenditures. 
63 Stat. 972. 
5 use 1071 note. 
Federal agency 
assistance. 
Reports. 
Termination. 
Appr 
opri 
ation. 
PUBLIC LAW 743-AUG. 31, 1954 ' 
[68 
S T A T . 
(c) The Commission is authorized to accept and utilize services of 
voluntary and uncompensated personnel and to pay any such per-
sonnel necessary traveling and subsistence expenses when engaged in 
the work of the Commission. 
(d) Within the limits of its appropriations, the Commission is 
authorized to appoint such personnel, without regard to the civil-
service laws and the Classification Act of 1923, as amended, to procure 
such printing and binding, and to make such expenditures as, in its 
discretion, it deems necessary. 
(e) The Commission is authorized to request and secure the advice 
or assistance of any Federal agency. Any Federal agency furnish-
ing advice or assistance to the Commission may expend its own funds 
for this purpose, with or without reimbursement from the Commis-
sion as may be agreed upon between the Commission and the agency. 
(f) The Commission shall report annually to the President and 
Congress its progress and recommendations pertaining to such a 
memorial. Upon the conclusion of its work, the Commission shall 
promptly submit a final report. 
(g) Thirty days after the submission of its final report the Com-
mission shall cease to exist. 
SEC. 6. There are hereby authorized to be appropriated such sums 
as may be necessary for the expenses of the Commission. 
Approved August 31, 1964. 
August 31, 1954 
[H. R. 6616] 
Copyrights. 
61 Stat. 655. 
Works of aliens. 
\'. A» 'if^^H^ 
Public Law 743 
' 
CHAPTER 1161 
AN ACT 
To amend title 17, United States Code, entitled "Copyrights". 
Be it enacted hy the Senate and House of Representatives 
of the 
United States of America in Congress asseTnbled, That section 9 of 
title 17, United States Code, is amended to read as follows: 
"§ 9. Authors or proprietors, entitled: aliens 
"The author or proprietor of any work made the subject of copy-
right by this title, or his executors, administrators, or assigns, shall 
have copyright for such work under the conditions and for the terms 
specified in this title: Provided, hoioever, That the copyright secured 
by this title shall extend to the work of an author or proprietor who 
is a citizen or subject of a foreign state or nation only under the 
conditions described in subsections (a), (b), or (c) below: 
"(a) When an alien author or proprietor shall be domiciled within 
the United States at the time of the first publication of his work; or 
"(b) When the foreign state or nation of which such author or 
proprietor is a citizen or subject grants, either by treaty, convention, 
agreement, or law, to citizens of the United States the benefit of 
copyright on substantially the same basis as to its own citizens, or 
copyright protection, substantially equal to the protection secured 
to such foreign author under this title or by treaty; or when such 
foreign state or nation is a party to an international agreement which 
provides for reciprocity in the granting of copyright, by the terms 
of which agreement the United States may, at its pleasure, become 
a party thereto. 
"The existence of the reciprocal conditions aforesaid shall be deter-
mined by the President of the United States, by proclamation made 
from time to time, as the purposes of this title may require: Provided, 
That whenever the President shall find that the authors, copyright 
owners, or proprietors of works first produced or published abroad 
and subject to copyright or to renewal of copyright under the laws of 
68 
S T A T . ] 
PUBLIC LAW 743-AUG. 31, 1954 
1031 
the United States, including works subject to ad interim copyright, 
are or may have been temporarily unable to comply with the conditions 
and formalities prescribed with respect to such works by the copyright 
laws of the United States, because of the disruption or suspension of 
facilities essential for such compliance, he may by proclamation grant 
such extension of time as he may deem appropriate for the fulfillment 
of such conditions or formalities by authors, copyright owners, or pro-
prietors who are citizens of the United States or who are nationals of 
countries which accord substantially equal treatment in this respect to 
authors, copyright owners, or proprietors who are citizens of the 
United States: Provided further^ That no liability shall attach under 
this title for lawful uses made or acts done prior to the effective date 
of such proclamation in connection with such works, or in respect to 
the continuance for one year subsequent to such date of any business 
undertaking or enterprise lawfully undertaken prior to such date 
involving expenditure or contractual obligation in connection with 
the exploitation, production, reproduction, circulation, or performance 
of any such work. 
"The President may at any time terminate any proclamation author-
ized herein or any part thereof or suspend or extend its operation for 
such period or periods of time as in his judgment the interests of the 
United States may require. 
"(c) When the Universal Copyright Convention, signed at Geneva 
on September 6, 1952, shall be in force between the United States of 
America and the foreign state or nation of which such author is a citi-
zen or subject, or in which the work was first published. 
Any work 
to which copyright is extended pursuant to this subsection shall be 
exempt from the following provisions of this title: (1) The require-
ment in section 1 (e) that a foreign state or nation must grant to 
United States citizens mechanical reproduction rights similar to those 
specified therein; (2) the obligatory deposit requirements of the first 
sentence of section 13; (3) the provisions of sections 14, 16, 17, and 
18; (4) the import prohibitions of section 107, to the extent that they 
are related to the manufacturing requirements of section 16; and (5) 
the requirements of sections 19 and 20: Provided^ however^ That such 
exemptions shall apply only if from the time of first publication all 
the copies of the work published with the authority of the author or 
other copyright proprietor shall bear the symbol © accompanied by 
the name of the copyright proprietor and the year of first publication 
placed in such manner and location as to give reasonable notice of 
claim of copyright. 
"Upon the coming into force of the Universal Copyright Conven-
tion in a foreign state or nation as hereinbefore provided, every book 
or periodical of a citizen or subject thereof in which ad interim copy-
right was subsisting on the effective date of said coming into force 
shall have copyright for twenty-eight years from the date of first 
publication abroad without the necessity of complying with the fur-
ther formalities specified in section 23 of this title. 
"The provisions of this subsection shall not be extended to works 
of an author who is a citizen of, or domiciled in the United States 
of America regardless of place of first publication, or to works first 
published in the United States." 
SEC. 2. Section 16 of title 17, United States Code, is amended to 
read as follows: 
"§ 16. Mechanical work to be done in United States 
"Of the printed book or periodical specified in section 5, subsections 
(a) and (b), of this title, except the original text of a book or periodi-
cal of foreign origin in a language or languages other than English, 
Universal Copy-
right Convention. 
61 Stat. 653. 
61 Stat. 656. 
61 S t a t . 
6 5 7, 
658, 663, intta. 
6 1 S t a t . 6 5 8: 
post, p. 1032. 
63 Stat. 154. 
61 Stat. 657. 
Printing in U. S. 
61 Stat. 654. 
1032 
PUBLIC LAW 743-AUG. 31, 1954 
[68 ST A T . 
61 Stat. 656. 658; 
inlra. 
63 Stat. 154, 
61 Stat. 663. 
61 Stat. 658. 
Notice of copy-
right. 
61 Stat. 656. 
61 Stat. 654. 
Effective date. 
the text of all copies accorded protection under this title, except as 
below provided, shall be printed from type set within the limits of 
the United States, either by hand or by the aid of any kind of type-
setting machine, or from plates made within the limits of the United 
States from type set therein, or, if the text be produced by litho-
graphic process, or photoengraving process, then by a process wholly 
performed within the limits of the United States, and the printing 
of the text and binding of the said book shall be performed within 
the limits of the United States; which requirements shall extend also 
to the illustrations within a book consisting of printed text and illus-
trations produced by lithographic process, or photoengraving process, 
and also to separate lithographs or photoengravings, except where in 
either case the subjects represented are located in a foreign country 
and illustrate a scientific work or reproduce a work of art: Provided^ 
hotoever, That said requirements shall not apply to works in raised 
characters for the use of the blind, or to books or periodicals of foreign 
origin in a language or languages other than English, or to works 
printed or produced in the United States by any other process than 
those above specified in this section, or to copies of books or periodi-
cals, first published abroad in the English language, imported into 
the United States within five years after first publication in a foreign 
state or nation up to the number of fifteen hundred copies of each 
such book or periodical if said copies shall contain notice of copy-
right in accordance with sections 10, 19, and 20 of this title and if 
ad interim copyright in said work shall have been obtained pursuant 
to section 22 of this title prior to the importation into the United 
States of any copy except those permitted by the provisions of section 
107 of this title: Provided further, That the provisions of this section 
shall not affect the right of importation under the provisions of sec-
tion 107 of this title." 
SEC. 3. Section 19 of title 17, United States Code, is amended to 
read as follows: 
"§ 19. Notice; form 
"The notice of copyright required by section 10 of this title shall 
consist either of the word 'Copyright', the abbreviation 'Copr.', or 
the symbol ©, accompanied by the name of the copyright proprietor, 
and if the work be a printed literary, musical, or dramatic work, the 
notice shall include also the year in which the copyright was secured 
by publication. In the case, however, of copies of works specified in 
subsections (f) to (k), inclusive, of section 5 of this title, the notice 
may consist of the letter C enclosed within a circle, thus ©, accom-
panied by the initials, monogram, mark, or symbol of the copyright 
proprietor: Provided, That on some accessible portion of such copies 
or of the margin, back, permanent base, or pedestal, or of the sub-
stance on which such copies shall be mounted, his name shall appear. 
But in the case of works in which copyright was subsisting on July 
1, 1909, the notice of copyright may be either in one of the forms 
prescribed herein or may consist of the following words: 'Entered 
according to Act of Congress, in the year 
, by A. B., in the office 
of th-e Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.,' or, at his 
option, the word 'Copyright', together with the year the copyright 
was entered and the name of the party by whom it was taken out; 
thus, 'Copyright, 19—, by A. B.' " 
SEC. 4. This Act shall take effect upon the coming into force of the 
Universal Copyright Convention in the United States of America. 
Approved August 31, '1954.