United States Code/Title 17/1976-10-18/Chapter 1/Section 9

by the United States Government

§ 9—Authors or proprietors, entitled; aliens

The author or proprietor of any work made the subject of copyright by this title, or his executors, administrators, or assigns, shall have copyright for such work under the conditions and for the terms specified in this title: Provided, however, That the copyright secured by this title shall extend to the work of an author or proprietor who is a citizen or subject of a foreign state or nation only under the conditions described in subsections (a), (b), or (c) below:

(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 title 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.

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 title may require: Provided, That whenever the President shall find that the authors, copyright owners, or proprietors of works first produced or published abroad and subject to copyright or to renewal of copyright under the laws of the United States, including works subject to ad interim copyright, are or may have been temporarily unable to comply with the conditions and formalities prescribed with respect to such works by the copyright laws of the United States, because of the disruption or suspension of facilities essential for such compliance, he may by proclamation grant such extension of time as he may deem appropriate for the fulfillment of such conditions or formalities by authors, copyright owners, or proprietors who are citizens of the United States or who are nationals of countries which accord substantially equal treatment in this respect to authors, copyright owners, or proprietors who are citizens of the United States: Provided further, That no liability shall attach under this title for lawful uses made or acts done prior to the effective date of such proclamation in connection with such works, or in respect to the continuance for one year subsequent to such date of any business undertaking or enterprise lawfully undertaken prior to such date involving expenditure or contractual obligation in connection with the exploitation,production, reproduction, circulation, or performance of any such work.

The President may at any time terminate any proclamation authorized herein or any part thereof or suspend or extend its operation for such period or periods of time as in his judgment the interests of the United States may require.

(c) When the Universal Copyright Convention, signed at Geneva on September 6, 1952, shall be in force between the United States of America and the foreign state or nation of which such author is a citizen or subject, or in which the work was first published. Any work to which copyright is extended pursuant to this subsection shall be exempt from the following provisions of this title:

(1) The requirement in section 1(e) that a foreign state or nation must grant to United States citizens mechanical reproduction rights similar to those specified therein;

(2) the obligatory deposit requirements of the first sentence of section 13;

(3) the provisions of sections 14, 16, 17, and 18;

(4) the import prohibitions of section 107, to the extent that they are related to the manufacturing requirements of section 16; and

(5) the requirements of sections 19 and 20: Provided, however, That such exemptions shall apply only if from the time of first publication all the copies of the work published with the authority of the author or other copyright proprietor shall bear the symbol © accompanied by the name of the copyright proprietor and the year of first publication placed in such manner and location as to give reasonable notice of claim of copyright.

Upon the coming into force of the Universal Copyright Convention in a foreign state or nation as hereinbefore provided, every book or periodical of a citizen or subject thereof in which ad interim copyright was subsisting on the effective date of said coming into force shall have copyright for twenty-eight years from the date of first publication abroad without the necessity of complying with the further formalities specified in section 23 of this title.

The provisions of this subsection shall not be extended to works of an author who is a citizen of, or domiciled in the United States of America regardless of place of first publication, or to works first published in the United States.

Amendment history

Section 9 was added by the Act of July 30, 1947 (c. 391, 61 Stat. 652) which codified the Copyright Act of 1909 (Mar. 4, 1909, 35 Stat. 1075). It was amended by the Act of August 31, 1954 (c. 1161, 68 Stat. 1030), § 1. It was repealed by the Copyright Act of 1976 (Pub. L. 94-553, Oct. 19, 1976, 90 Stat. 2541) with effect from January 1, 1978.

Proclamations and treaties

Apart from the Universal Copyright Convention mentioned in this section, which came into force with respect to the United States on September 16, 1955, the United States was also a party to the Convention on literary and artistic copyright between the United States and other American Republics ("Buenos Aires Convention"), signed at the Fourth International Conference of American States at Buenos Aires on August 11, 1910: U.S. ratification was deposited on May 1, 1911, and the Convention proclaimed by the President of the United States on July 13, 1914.

Details of bilateral treaties and of proclamations under this section may be found in the Wikipedia article "Bilateral copyright agreements of the United States". For current provisions, see 17 U.S.C. 104.