Court Opinion

ID: 9421961
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:00:43.029094+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:33.421420
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Douglas
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Petitioner, a music publisher, sued respondent, another music publisher, for infringement of petitioner’s rights through one Ben Black, as coauthor, in the renewal copyright of the song “Moonlight and Roses.” Respondent’s motion for summary judgment was granted, 158 F. Supp. 188, and the Court of Appeals affirmed by a divided vote. 265 F. 2d 925. The case is here on a petition for a writ of certiorari which we granted. 361 U. S. 809. .
The facts are stipulated. Ben Black and Charles Daniels composed the song and assigned it to Villa Moret, Inc., which secured the original copyright. Prior to the expiration of the 28-year term, Black assigned to peti*374tioner his renewal rights in this song in consideration of certain royalties and the sum of $1,000. Black had no wife or child; and his next of kin were three brothers. Each of them executed a like assignment of his renewal expectancy and delivered it to petitioner. These assignments were recorded in the copyright office. Before the expiration of the original copyright, Black died, leaving no widow or child. His will contained no specific bequest concerning the renewal copyright. His residuary estate was left to his nephews and nieces. One of the brothers qualified as executor of the will and renewed the copyright for a further term of 28 years. The probate court decreed distribution of the renewal copyright to the residuary legatees. Respondent then obtained assignments from them.
The question for decision is whether by statute the renewal rights accrue to the executor in spite of a prior assignment by his testator. Section 23 of the Copyright Act of 1909, 35 Stat. 1075, now 17 U. S. C. § 24, after stating that “the proprietor of such copyright shall be entitled to a renewal and extension of the copyright in such work for the further term of twenty-eight years,” goes on to provide:
“That . . . the author of such work, if still living, or the widow, widower, or children of the author, if the author be not living, or if such author, widow, widower, or children be not living, then the author’s executors, or in the absence of a will, his next of kin shall be entitled to a renewal and extension of the copyright in such work for a further term of twenty-eight years when application for such renewal and extension shall have been made to the copyright office and duly registered therein within one year prior to the expiration of the original term of copyright.”
*375An assignment by an author of his renewal rights made before the original copyright expires is valid against the world, if the author is alive at the commencement of the renewal period. Fisher Co. v. Witmark & Sons, 318 U. S. 643, so holds. It is also clear, all questions of assignment apart, that the renewal rights go by statute to an executor, absent a widow or child. Fox Film Corp. v. Knowles, 261 U. S. 326, so holds.
Petitioner argues that the executor’s right under the statute can be defeated through a prior assignment by the testator. If the widow, widower, and children were the claimants, concededly no prior assignment could bar them. For they are among those to whom § 24 has granted the renewal right, irrespective of whether the author in his lifetime has or has not made any assignment of it. See De Sylva v. Ballentine, 351 U. S. 570. Petitioner also concedes — and we see no rational escape from that conclusion — that where the author dies intestate prior to the renewal period leaving no widow, widower, or children, the next of kin obtain the renewal copyright free of any claim founded upon an assignment made by the author in his lifetime. These results follow not because the author’s assignment is invalid but because he had only an expectancy to assign;1 and his death, prior to the renewal period, terminates his interest in the renewal which by § 24 vests in the named classes. The right to obtain a renewal copyright and the renewal copyright itself exist only by reason of the Act and are derived solely and directly from it.
*376We fail to see the difference in this statutory scheme between widows, widowers, children, or next of kin on the one hand and executors on the other. The hierarchy of people granted renewal rights by § 24 are first, the author if living; second, the widow, widower, or children, if he or she is not living; third, his or her executors if the author and the widow, widower; or children are not living ; fourth, in absence of a will, the next of kin. True, these are disparate interests. Yet Congress saw fit to treat them alike. It seems clear to us, for example, that by the force of § 24, if Black had died intestate, his next of kin would take as against the assignee of the renewal right. Congress in its wisdom expressed a preference for that group against the world, if the author, the widow, the widower, or children are not living. By § 24 his executors are placed in the same preferred position, unless we refashion § 24 to suit other policy considerations. Of course an executor usually takes in a representative capacity. He “represents the person of his testator” as Fox Film Corp. v. Knowles, supra, at 330, states. And that normally means that when the testator has made contracts, the executor takes cum onere. Yet it is also true, as pointed out in Fox Film Corp. v. Knowles, supra, at 330, that “it is no novelty” for the executor “to be given rights that the testator could not have exercised while he lived.” It is clear that under this Act the executor’s right to renew is independent of the author’s rights at the time of his death. What Congress has done by § 24 is to create contingent renewal rights. Congress has provided that, when the author dies before the renewal period arrives, special rules in derogation of the usual rules of succession are to apply for the benefit of three classes of people — (1) widows, widowers, and children; (2) executors; and (3) next of kin. We think we would redesign § 24 if we held that executors, named as one of the preferred classes, do not acquire the renewal rights, where *377there has been a prior assignment, though widows, widowers, and children or next of kin would acquire them. Certainly Fox Film Corp. v. Knowles, supra, 329-330, states that what one of the three could have done, either of the others may do. Mr. Justice Holmes speaking for the Court said:
“No one doubts that if Carleton had died leaving ■ a widow she could have applied as the executor did, and executors are mentioned alongside of the widow with no suggestion in the statute that when executors are the proper persons, if anyone, to make the claim, they cannot make it whenever a widow might have made it. The next of kin come after the executors. Surely they again have the same rights that the widow would have had.”
The legislative history supports that view:
“Instead of confining the right of renewal to the author, if still living, or to the widow or children of the author, if he be dead, we provide that the author of such work, if still living, may apply for the renewal, or the widow, widower, or children of the author, if the author be not living, or if such author, widow, widower, or children be not living, then the author’s executors, or, in the absence of a will, his next of kin. It was not the intention to permit the administrator to apply for the renewal, but to permit the author who had no wife or children to bequeath by will the right to apply for the renewal.” 2
The category of persons entitled to renewal rights therefore cannot be cut down and reduced as petitioner would have us do. Section 24 reflects, it seems to us, a consistent policy to treat renewal rights as expectancies until the renewal period arrives. When that time arrives, *378the renewal rights pass to one of the four classes listed in § 24 according to the then-existing circumstances. Until that time arrives, assignees of renewal rights take the risk that the rights acquired may never vest in their assignors. A purchaser of such an interest is deprived of nothing. Like all purchasers of contingent interests, he takes subject to the possibility that the contingency may not occur. For example, an assignment from an author and his wife will be ineffective, if on his death another woman is the widow. Examples could be multiplied. We have said enough, however, to indicate that there is symmetry and logic in the design of § 24. Whether it works at times an injustice is a matter for the Congress, not for us.

Affirmed.

 Spring, Risks and Rights in Publishing, Television, Radio, Motion Pictures, Advertising, and the Theatre (2d rev. ed. 1956), pp. 94-95; Ball, The Law of Copyright and Literary Property (1944), §243; Ladas, International Protection of Literary and Artistic Property (1938), Vol. II, p. 772. But see Shafter, Musical Copyright (2d ed. 1939), p. 177.

 H. R. Rep. No. 2222, 60th Cong., 2d Sess., p. 15. And see S. Rep. No. 1108, 60th Cong., 2d Sess., p. 15.