Office of the Historian

Proclamation 1289.

By the President of the United States of America,

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas it is provided by the Act of Congress of March 4, 1909, entitled “An Act to Amend and Consolidate the Acts Respecting Copyright,” that the provisions of said Act, “so far as they secure copyright controlling the parts of instruments serving to reproduce mechanically the musical work, shall include only compositions published and copyrighted after the Act goes into effect, and shall not include the works of a foreign author or composer unless the foreign state or nation of which such author or composer is a citizen or subject grants, either by treaty, convention, agreement, or law, to citizens of the United States similar rights”:

And whereas it is further provided that the copyright secured by the Act shall extend to the work of an author or proprietor who is a citizen or subject of a foreign state or nation, only upon certain conditions set forth in section 8 of said Act, to wit:

(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 Act 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:

And whereas it is also provided by said section that “The existence of the reciprocal conditions aforesaid shall be determined by the President of the United States, by proclamation made from time to time as the purposes of this Act may require”:

And whereas satisfactory official assurance has been given that, by virtue of the authority conferred by the British Copyright Act, [Page 426] 1911, a British Order in Council has been issued of even date with this Proclamation directing:

1.
That “the Copyright Act, 1911, including the provisions as to existing works, shall, subject to the provisions of the said Act and of this Order, apply—
(a)
to literary, dramatic, musical and artistic works the authors whereof were at the time of the making of the works citizens of the United States of America, in like manner as if the authors had been British subjects:
(b)
in respect of residence in the United States of America, in like manner as if such residence had been residence in the parts of His Majesty’s dominions to which the said Act extends.
Provided that—
(i)
the term of copyright within the parts of His Majesty’s dominions to which this Order applies shall not exceed that conferred by the law of the United States of America:
(ii)
the enjoyment of the rights conferred by this Order shall be subject to the accomplishment of the conditions and formalities prescribed by the law of the United States of America:
(iii)
in the application to existing works of the provisions of Section 24 of the Copyright Act, 1911, the commencement of this Order shall be substituted for the 26th July, 1910, in subsection 1 (b).”
2.
That “this Order shall apply to all His Majesty’s dominions, colonies and possessions with the exception of those hereinafter named, that is to say:—The Dominion of Canada, The Commonwealth of Australia, The Dominion of New Zealand, The Union of South Africa, Newfoundland.”
3.
That “this Order shall come into operation on the first day of January, 1915, which day is in this Order referred to as the commencement of this Order.
And the Lords Commissioners of His Majesty’s Treasury are to give the necessary Orders accordingly.”

Now, therefore, I, Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States of America, do declare and proclaim that one of the alternative conditions specified in section 8 (b) of the Act of March 4, 1909, now exists and is fulfilled in respect to the subjects of Great Britain and the British dominions, colonies and possessions, with the exception of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and Newfoundland, and that such subjects shall be entitled to all the benefits of section I (e) of the said Act, on and after January 1, 1915.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington this first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and fifteen, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and thirty-ninth.

[seal.]
Woodrow Wilson.

By the President:
W. J. Bryan,
Secretary of State.