in the needed revisal
of our local copyright law we can attain some measure of justice. Some of
the most obvious hardships can be removed. There is no reason why an
author should pay for the privilege of a long life by the loss of his
copyrights, and that his old age should be embittered by poverty because
he cannot have the results of the labor of his vigorous years. There is
no reason why if he dies young he should leave those dependent on him
without support, for the public has really no more right to appropriate
his book than it would have to take his house from his widow and
children. His income at best is small after he has divided with the
publishers.

No, there can certainly be no valid argument against extending the
copyright of the author to his own lifetime, with the addition of forty
or fifty years for the benefit of his heirs. I will not leave this
portion of the topic without saying that a perfectly harmonious relation
between authors and publishers is most earnestly to be desired, nor
without the frank acknowledgment that, in literary tradition and in the
present experience, many of the most noble friendships and the most
generous and helpful relations have subsisted, as they ought always to
subsist, between the producers and the distributors of literature,
especially when the publisher has a love for literature, and the author
is a reasonable being and takes pains to inform himself about the
publishing business.

One aspect of the publishing business which has become increasingly
prominent during the last fifteen years cannot be overlooked, for it is
certain to affect seriously the production of literature as to quality,
and its distribution. Capital has discovered that literature is a product
out of which money can be made, in the same way that it can be made in
cotton, wheat, or iron. Never before in history has so much money been
invested in publishing, with the single purpose of creating and supplying
the market with manufactured goods. Never before has there been such an
appeal to the reading public, or such a study of its tastes, or supposed
tastes, wants, likes and dislikes, coupled also with the same shrewd
anxiety to ascertain a future demand that governs the purveyors of spring
and fall styles in millinery and dressmaking. Not only the contents of
the books and periodicals, but the covers, must be made to catch the
fleeting fancy. Will the public next season wear its hose dotted or
striped?