Supreme Court Will Hear Case on Foreign Copyrights

The United States Supreme Court has granted certiorari in Golan v. Holder, a case that challenges a law reinstating copyright protection to some foreign works that were previously in the public domain. The works were removed due to the 1994 enactment of the Uruguay Round Agreements Act (URAA), an amendment to the Copyright Act.

As a result of URAA, licensing fees must be paid before some foreign works can be used by orchestra conductors, performers, archivists, publishers, and others. Among the works that URAA removed from the public domain are symphonies by Prokofiev, Stravinsky, and Shostakovich; books by C.S. Lewis, Virginia Woolf and H.G. Wells; films by Federico Fellini, Alfred Hitchcock and Jen Renoir; and artwork by M.C. Escher and Picasso.

The Court is being asked to rule on two issues: whether Congress exceeded its power by removing the works from the public domain, and whether URAA violates the First Amendment rights to free speech. The Court will likely hear oral arguments in Fall 2011.