Royalties to Uncle Sam for Use of Shakespeare?
The late Sen. Sam Ervin, a great hulk of a man who attained a degree of immortality as the chairman of Capitol Hill's historic Watergate probe, had a wonderful habit. He seldom entered the Senate chamber without bearing a copy of the Constitution on his person, usually a dogeared pamphlet version protruding from a jacket pocket. During his floor speeches he often cited relevant portions of the document spawned by the Founding Fathers.</br></br>Present-day legislators could increase respect for the lawmaking process if they occasionally emulated Ervin's habit. It certainly would have stood the Senate in good stead if one of its members had consulted the Constitution's copyright-patent clauses when S.1264 came up for a vote last month.</br></br>As most bills go, S.1264 -- an amendment to the statute under which the National Endowments of the Arts and Humanities operate -- was on the whole a creditable piece of legislative draftsmanship. Unfortunately, it was marred by a provision the sponsor of the measure, Sen. Dan Quayle (R., Ind.), undoubtedly would have omitted if he had taken into account the Constitution's copyright-patent clause and/or the Supreme Court's decisions on its inherent limitations.</br></br>On its face, the provision in question seems reasonable enough. It merely authorizes preparation of a study to "determine the feasibility" of creating "a revolving fund comprised of payments made to the Federal Government for the right (anyone's right) to use or publicly perform artistic, dramatic, literary, and musical works in the public domain."</br></br>Merely isn't quite the right word. Judging by what's spelled out in the provision's 12 subsections about the "scope, direction, and focus" of the study, it seems to be premised on the curious notion that it's desirable to vest the federal government with control over literally countless words that have become part of the public domain over the years.