Opinion ID: 187426
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Designation of a Single Collective

Text: As discussed above, the Judges designated a single organizationknown as the collectiveto receive royalties from licensees and distribute payments to copyright owners, performers, and any agents designated on their behalf to receive such payments. The Judges selected SoundExchange, rather than Royalty Logic, to serve this function. Royalty Logic argues that the Judges' designation of only one collective was contrary to the statute. [3] We disagree. Royalty Logic relies principally on 17 U.S.C. § 114(e)(1), which allows copyright owners and licensees, in negotiating statutory licenses, to designate common agents on a nonexclusive basis to negotiate, agree to, pay, or receive payments. Royalty Logic contends that the statute confers on copyright owners or their designated agents the right to receive royalty payments directly from licensees. It also argues that Congress's use of the word nonexclusive to describe the designated agents means that the Judges could not give a single entity the exclusive ability to receive payments. But this statute does not speak to the Judges' authority. By its terms, it simply exempts copyright owners and licensees from any provision of the antitrust laws to allow them to designate common agents to negotiate rates and terms under the statutory license that will apply in lieu of the Judges' decision. Id. Moreover, the statute merely authorizes copyright owners to designate agents to receive royalty payments; it does not mandate that those payments come directly from licensees rather than an intermediary collective. Id. Royalty Logic also argues that, by giving the Judges the authority to set terms of royalty payments, id. § 114(f)(2)(A), Congress meant them to determine only how and when payments are made. But other provisions of the statutory licensing scheme make clear that Congress contemplated a role for the Judges in deciding who would actually receive royalty payments. For example, in providing for the continuity of royalty rates and terms while a motion for reconsideration is pending before the Judges, the statute requires the entity designated by the Copyright Royalty Judges to which such royalties are paid to return any excess payments once the motion is resolved. Id. § 803(c)(2)(E)(iii). Likewise, payments to the entity designated by the Copyright Royalty Judges must continue during the pendency of an appeal to this court, and that entity must return excess payments following the conclusion of the appeal. Id. § 803(d)(2)(C)(ii). Both provisions presuppose that, in setting the rates and terms of the statutory license, the Judges will designate a single entity to receive royalty payments. Following the fundamental canon of statutory construction that the words of a statute must be read in their context and with a view to their place in the overall statutory scheme, Davis v. Mich. Dep't of Treasury, 489 U.S. 803, 809, 109 S.Ct. 1500, 103 L.Ed.2d 891 (1989), we cannot accept Royalty Logic's unduly narrow reading of the word terms in Section 114(f)(2)(A). Thus, in selecting SoundExchange as the sole collective, the Judges fulfilled Congress's expectation that they would designate a single entity to receive royalty payments from licensees. And contrary to Royalty Logic's argument, the Judges have not deprived copyright owners of the right to select their own receiving agents. Any copyright owner is free to negotiate, on its own or through an agent, for a method of payment that bypasses SoundExchange. But in the absence of a privately negotiated agreement, the Judges may designate a single entity to receive, process, and distribute royalty payments under the statutory license.