Re: copyright and natural law?

On Thu, 10 Sep 1998, Mark Lemley <mlemley[_at_]mail.law.berkeley.edu> wrote:
>
> With respect to Dr. Roettinger, while his natural law approach may
> comport with some European laws, it is *not* the basis for U.S. law.
> Copyright in the U.S. is explicitly an instrumental grant, designed
> to give an incentive for authors to create. It is defined and
> limited by statute; if there were no statute, there would be no
> right of ownership.

Did no common law copyright exist that would apply in the absence of statute? I had always assumed that US copyright law replaced common law rights as happened in other jurisdictions - is this incorrect?

-cd

Cappone D'Angelo
<cappyd[_at_]uvic.ca> Received on Sun Sep 13 1998 - 04:04:03 GMT