"The fault, dear Godfrey, is not in the laws,
But in yourself, if you are pirated!"
However, if you seriously ask me whether there is no chance of an alteration in the laws, even should you persist in refusing the invitation to America, I will candidly answer, that the progress of civilisation is probably independent even of you, and may very likely win the honours which would be yours, had you the boldness which fortune delights to favour. If you think me too sanguine, you can possibly obtain an interview with Mr Dickens, and qualify my representations by the discouraging views he will give you. They say here, that he came out to America on purpose to dun brother Jonathan, and it is still spoken of with surprise, that though shrewdly invited to dinner, he was not deterred from presenting his bill at the table. The slight misunderstanding to which such a manœuvre very naturally gave rise, may have seemed to justify his doubts, as they did to check the good intentions of his entertainers, with regard to the speedy adjustment of grievances; yet I think I am not mistaken in believing that popular sentiment in this country is just now setting strongly in favour of a community of copyright between America and Great Britain.
As a mere question of ethics, it can hardly be expected that while doctors disagree, the popular conscience should be much disturbed by the flagrancy of the present laws; yet it is only justice to the tone of moral feeling which characterises what may fairly be called society in America, to say that it is correct, if not even generous. The leading periodicals, which may be taken as an index of the opinions of educated men in general, have always been true to principle in the discussion of this matter. The New York Review, which, during a brief but honourable career was regarded as speaking the high-toned sentiments of American churchmen, contained an elaborate article, as early as in 1839, in which the conduct of Congress, reference to the famous "British Authors' petition," was severely rebuked, and criticised as scandalously unprincipled and disgraceful. About the same time, under cover of its provincial blue and yellow, the North American, or, as Mr Cooper calls it, the East American came out in defence of justice as toweringly as even Maga herself. The "British Authors' petition" had been fiercely opposed by a "Boston booksellers' memorial," which, among other things addressed to the lowest passions of the mob, argued against a copyright law, that it would prevent them from altering and interpolating English books, to accommodate republican tastes! Hear then how the Boston reviewers – who in spite of that snobbish sectarian air of perkiness and pretension which is usually ascribed to them, can now and then do things very handsomely – pounce upon their townsmen's morality. "We cannot help expressing our surprise," say they,2 "that the strange and dishonourable ground assumed in that memorial, has not been more pointedly reprobated. We can only account for the adoption of such a document at all, by a body of respectable men, on the supposition that its piratical doctrine, respecting literary property, escaped the notice of the convention; … for in our view, the doctrine to which those respectable gentlemen seemed to give their public support, was one to be mentioned, not in the company of honest men, but only in the society of footpads, housebreakers, and pickpockets." In an earlier number of the same work3 – which was lashed by the New York Review for its astounding ignorance of the most celebrated letters of Junius, and for quoting a judicial opinion of Lord Kaimes's as a speech in the House of Lords – the reviewer, whose blundering intrepidity is only saved from the ridiculous by the honesty of his attempt, comes down on a nobler quarry, and thwacks the memory of Lord Camden as if he had been another Thersites. Sir Joseph Yates gets a sound drubbing from the same sturdy avenger of literary property, for his share in the celebrated case of Millar versus Taylor, as given in Burrow's Reports.4 I have been pleased too with the succinct decision of a writer5 who has produced an elaborate work on political ethics, in which he lays it down that "the right of property in a book seems to be clearer and more easily to be deduced from absolute principle than any other." Except among the most ultra and radical of theorists, I have met with nothing in American society, but a most hearty subscription to such views as these: but, alas! – said one in conversation upon this subject, – it is nothing that we think right, nor would it be much to bring the people to agree with us, unless something shall force it upon our demagogues.
Public opinion is not always sovereign in America, as the remark of my friend implies. It is curious to see how often a written constitution deprives a people of the very privileges it was intended to perpetuate and secure; and how the practical working of the American constitution is frequently the very reverse of its design. By the constitutional provisions, it would seem apparent, for instance, that the president of this confederacy must always be the choice of a majority of the nation's wisest men, themselves the free choice of the majority of the people. Yet here I have lived under three successive presidents, General Harrison, Mr Tyler, and Mr Polk, not one of them succeeding by the free choice of any one, and Mr Tyler against the suffrages of all. The undefiled patriotism which is the hypothesis of the constitution, does not exist; party, which it seems hardly to anticipate, carries every thing; and parties are ruled by cabals. Thus the greatest national measures, instead of originating with the people, and taking shape in the hands of their servants, are begotten in closets and conclaves, dictated to time-servers and adventurers, and forced on the people, they cannot tell how – but in the name of democracy and freedom. Yet, after all, public opinion is important, because when even demagogues are inclined to do right, it is fatal to their action if public opinion be wrong. For this reason, it may be well for you to understand how far public opinion has advanced with regard to our question. Its progress has been slow, but I believe always in the right direction. Things promised well, when the Oregon dispute became the occasion of an unnatural animosity against Great Britain, and every measure which she was supposed to approve. In the hurly-burly of wind and dust that was blown up under that passing cloud, it is not to be wondered that Dickens and copyright were as completely forgotten as orthography, etymology, syntax and prosody, and whatever else goes to the art of using language correctly. A strip of land that would not purchase the copyright of an almanac, became the subject of the fiercest congressional interest; and the rights of authors, and with them the noblest relations of the republic to the other estates of the world, for the time were wholly lost sight of. "Copyright" then passed into a watchword with some of those underlings of literature, who thought to ride into favour as Cobden has been carried into fortune, by taking the tide at its ebb and ("like little wanton boys that swim on bladders") invoking the flood, as if their yelping and outcries would bring the turn any sooner. A copyright club was got up, it is said by a mere clique in this city, to which, from the mere justice of its proposed ends, large numbers of respectable men, throughout the country, gave in their nominal adhesion. I am not aware that it has accomplished any other result than to favour some ambitious young gentlemen in acquiring the autographs of eminent persons abroad, with whom they opened an officious correspondence; for it has been very generally voted a humbug, and has served to disgust many with the very sound of "copyright," which has thus been degraded into harmony with the scream of "Repeal" and "Free Trade." For awhile, none joined the vociferation, according to my informant, but persons whose stake in literary property was about