Chamberlain v. Feldman

New York Court of Appeals
89 N. E.2d 863, 300 N.Y. 135, 84 U.S.P.Q. (BNA) 148 (1949)

ELI5:

Rule of Law:

Common-law copyright, specifically the right of first publication, is a property right distinct from the ownership of the physical manuscript, and the transfer of the material object does not transfer the intellectual property rights unless there is clear evidence of the author's intent to do so.

Facts:

In 1876, Mark Twain wrote a story titled 'A Murder, A Mystery and A Marriage' and briefly considered a collaborative publication scheme that never materialized.
Twain died in 1910, and the manuscript was not found among his effects and had never been published.
The manuscript eventually came into the possession of a Dr. James Brentano Clemens, who was unrelated to the author, through unknown means.
In 1945, Defendant Feldman purchased the original signed manuscript at an auction of Dr. Clemens' estate.
Feldman requested permission from the plaintiffs, the successors to Twain's literary property, to publish the story.
The plaintiffs refused to grant permission for publication.
Despite the refusal, Feldman proceeded to publish the work and attempted to register a statutory copyright.

Procedural Posture:

Plaintiffs sued Defendant Feldman in the New York Supreme Court (trial court) to enjoin publication of the manuscript and cancel the copyright.
The trial court dismissed the complaint on the merits, presuming that the transfer of the manuscript included the transfer of rights.
Plaintiffs appealed to the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court.
The Appellate Division reversed the trial court's dismissal, made new findings of fact that no rights were transferred, and granted judgment for the Plaintiffs restraining publication.
Defendant Feldman appealed the decision to the New York Court of Appeals.

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Issue:

Does the purchase of an original, unpublished manuscript at an auction convey to the buyer the common-law copyright and right of first publication when there is no evidence that the author intended to transfer those specific literary rights?

Opinions:

Majority - Judge Desmond

No, the mere ownership of a physical manuscript does not automatically grant the owner the right to publish the work contained within it. The court reasoned that common-law copyright, or the right of first publication, is fundamentally different from the property right in the physical paper itself. Relying on the principle that the right to reproduce belongs to the author until explicitly disposed of, the court found that the transfer of the physical paper does not necessarily pass the intellectual property rights. Since there was no evidence that Mark Twain ever intended to publish this specific work or that he voluntarily transferred the publication rights to anyone during his lifetime, the court concluded that the literary rights remained with his estate. The court rejected the presumption that an unexplained transfer of the manuscript carried the copyright with it.

Analysis:

This case is a seminal decision in intellectual property law regarding the distinction between 'corpus' (the physical object) and 'rights' (the intangible property). It establishes a high burden of proof for collectors and possessors of historical documents who wish to publish them, requiring them to show a chain of title that includes the literary rights, not just the physical item. The decision prioritizes the author's (and their estate's) control over whether a work is shared with the public, even decades after death. The court also briefly touches upon public policy concerns regarding keeping literary works out of the public domain but defers such policy changes to the Legislature.

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