Arguments before the Committee on Patents of the House of Representatives Part 42

Mr. CAMERON. I am not making this statement theoretically nor as a lawyer. I make it as an expert in this particular art. I have spent months and months of time with the microscope myself striving to do that very thing, and I know it can not be done.

Now, let us go one step further. What is it that makes that graphophonic record valuable? I can take Mr. Sousa's score and I can select some person, some alleged musician in this audience, and I can hand him a graphophone and tell him to make that record, and it would not be worth one cent upon the market. It takes the genius of a Sousa to play into the horn. It takes the voice of the magnificent singer to sing into the horn; and it takes the skill of the mechanician who is operating the graphophone to make a fine record that has a marketable value.

You ask me if I would use Sousa's march, make that record and sell it, and not pay him any royalty. I answer, "Yes; I would;" because I have paid him royalty. Whenever Mr. Sousa publishes one of his pieces of music and puts it out upon the market and I pay the price of that music, that sheet of music pa.s.ses from under the monopoly, just as when I patent a cornet and sell the cornet to Mr. Sousa, and he pays the price for it, it pa.s.ses out from under the patent monopoly, and he has a right to use it. Suppose I should come here and say to you that every time one of Mr. Sousa's cornet players played the cornet that I had sold to him that he should pay me royalty for having played it!

That is what he is asking of you. That is not all.

Mr. Sousa himself does not scorn, as he pretended to the other day, these "infernal talking machines." The day has been when Mr. Sousa himself came with advance scores and begged to have them put upon the machines, in order that they might popularize his own music. Nor is that all. He to-day is under contract, and he plays into these "infernal machines" with his band, and he is contributing, as he told you a few days ago, to stifle these "beautiful young voices that now have disappeared throughout our city and our land." [Laughter.] He does it for the almighty dollar. That is what he is after, and he frankly told you so.

Mr. SOUSA. I am honest, anyway. [Laughter.]

Mr. CAMERON. You are; and, as I said to you the other day, I respect you for it. All the men urging this bill are not as honest as you are, sir.

Mr. CHANEY. That is neither here nor there. We give them all credit for being honest.

Mr. CAMERON. I would not have made that remark if I had not been interrupted.

It was stated a moment ago, and it is a fact of which I wanted to speak, that the intention here is to give everyone a fair show. The gentleman here on my left (Mr. Webb) suggested that this bill would not prohibit the perforated music rolls (and the same question would apply to the graphophonic cylinder) from the reproduction of those pieces of music or other copyrightable works which had appeared and been copyrighted prior to this act. In that he is in error. Section 3 says:

Any and all reproductions, or copies thereof, in whatever form, style, or size, and all matter reproduced therein in which copyright is already subsisting.

So that it does not go only to matter that is copyrighted subsequent to the pa.s.sage of this act.

Mr. WEBB. I was speaking particularly of section g. That was the section that the gentleman was objecting to, and I referred to that particular portion.

Mr. CAMERON. The act, however, would apply by reason of section 3 to subsisting copyright.

Mr. WEBB. Yes; that may be so.

Mr. CAMERON. There is a situation in the talking-machine art that is perhaps divisible. You see two distinct forms of records. The company which I represent--the American Graphophone Company--makes both of those forms. There are a great many other companies, some of them making the machines and the records, and some of them making only the records. Some of them make the cylindrical form of record and some of them make the disk form of record; but there are two large, prominent companies, one of which makes the disk form of record and the other of which makes the cylindrical form of record. As I say, the company which I represent makes both.

Follow me now, if you please. There is also as close a musical trust, as has already been said to you by my predecessor, in this country as it is possible to form. That extends not only throughout this country, but throughout the world. There are a few musical geniuses who are able to stand above it and make them scramble for the genius. You have two of them with you to-day, Victor Herbert and John Philip Sousa. But John Philip Sousa can not speak for the struggling young composer who is not powerful enough to compel this trust to come to him instead of the young man going to the trust.

How does that effect us? Did you hear any opposition to this bill from the attorney of the Victor Talking Machine Company? No. They make the disk form of record. Have you heard any opposition from the National Phonograph Works--the Edison Company--in regard to this bill? No. They make the cylindrical form of record. Why does the Victor Talking Machine Company come here with such a virtuous show of regard for the author, and say they have no objection to this? Why is not the representative of the Edison Company--the National Phonograph Works--here opposing this bill? Because, as I charge, and I think I can substantiate it before I get through--not here, but I mean before the hearings before this committee are through--there is under way the same iniquitous proceeding that was outlined to you by my predecessor in connection with the music rolls.

Mr. PETt.i.t. That is absolutely untrue, as far as the Victor Talking Machine is concerned.

Mr. CAMERON. You can have a chance to reply when your time comes.

One company gets the exclusive right to make the disk form of record from copyrighted music, and the other the exclusive right to make the cylindrical form of record. Let us a.s.sume for a minute that what the gentleman says is literally true. Let us a.s.sume, I say. Is it not possible for just that combination to be made, and should the American Graphophone Company, which has millions of dollars invested in the enterprise, honestly and fairly built up under the laws of this country, money put in and money which it had an absolute right to presume the law would protect--should that company be placed in the position where it should be practically driven out of business by any such monopolistic combination? Will you gentlemen give them that opportunity?

I am not prepared to say that this music publishers' combination is the most gigantic trust on earth, but it is an absolutely close and effective trust. You may reply that we have the right to play and put upon these records all of the old noncopyrighted productions, those that are now within the public domain. To that I reply that the perforated music roll man or the talking machine man who attempts to rely solely upon old music will go out of business inside of eighteen months. He has got to meet the demand for the popular airs of the day.

He has got to be able to produce Sousa's and Victor Herbert's latest productions. "I want what I want when I want it." That is where the public stands. [Laughter.] You wait three years instead of fifty, and where would we be?

Moreover, we go to j.a.pan, we go to China, we go to the various countries of the earth, and make these records--get the original records. We do not make the original record on that disk. We do not make it upon that cylinder. We make an original record from the voice of the singer. That original record in the case of the cylinder is first very carefully covered with plumbago, to render it electrically conductive. It is then electroplated with copper; by applying cold, the original record is shrunk out, and you then have a mold, which has on its interior a perfect counterpart of the sound groove cut upon the face of the original record. We pour into that mold melted wax, or a composition that is called wax in the trade. When that is hot, it takes the impression of the mold and retains that until it sets; and as it cools it contracts, and we are then able to withdraw that from the mold, and after tr.i.m.m.i.n.g the ends, that reproduction, that copy, is as perfect a record as the original one. If it were not so, we could not make and sell a record for fifty cents when we have to pay the singer from $500 to $1,000 or $3,000 for making the original record.

Mr. WEBB. I was going to ask, How do you get Mr. Sousa's pieces? Do you pay him for it?

Mr. CAMERON. We do not; no, sir.

Mr. WEBB. Who does?

Mr. CAMERON. The Victor Talking Machine Company has an exclusive contract with Mr. Sousa, and he gets paid for that. He did not tell you that the other day.

Mr. SOUSA. That is absolutely untrue.

Mr. CAMERON. If it is untrue I am ready to beg the gentleman's pardon.

I had that information direct this morning, but I will gladly withdraw it upon Mr. Sousa's word--gladly. I do not want to make any misstatement.

Mr. SOUSA. I have never received one penny for my compositions from any kind of talking machine, nor have I ever made a contract with any of those companies.

Mr. CAMERON. I did not state that. I stated that Mr. Sousa, with his band, played into the horns of these instruments to make these records and was paid for doing it.

Mr. SOUSA. An organization known as "Sousa and his band," employed just as any other body of musicians, in which I have no part myself, plays into the instrument. That goes under arrangements made with the management of that organization to play anybody's compositions that these firms may elect; it may be a noncopyrighted piece or a copyrighted piece, or anything else.

Mr. CAMERON. I am very glad Mr. Sousa stated that. He says that he does not play his own music only, but his band stands ready to play any other man's music, copyrighted or not copyrighted, into these machines.

Mr. SOUSA. Not myself; no.

Senator LATIMER. I want to ask a question of Mr. Sousa, so as to clear the matter up a little further. The statement is that you have a band that plays into these instruments, and you, I understand, have denied that?

Mr. SOUSA. No, sir; I do not deny that "Sousa and his band," an organization known as "Sousa and his band," play for talking machines.

Senator LATIMER. Do I understand you to say that you have no connection with that band?

Mr. SOUSA. I am the director of that band, but I have no personal part in the performance of those pieces. I have never been in the gramophone company's office in my life.

Mr. MCGAVIN. Do you play for anyone else besides the Victor Talking Machine Company?

Mr. SOUSA. My manager has a contract with them for so many performances.

Senator LATIMER. You have an interest in the band and receive profit from it?

Mr. SOUSA. Yes; surely.

Mr. WEBB. You allow your name to be used all over the country?

Mr. SOUSA. In the performance of these pieces, certainly.

Mr. CAMERON. That was my charge.

Mr. HERBERT. In regard to the untruth the gentleman has stated----

The CHAIRMAN. Do you want to deny any statement that he has made?

Mr. HERBERT. Yes. In regard to this, naturally it would be inferred that it was the same case with me. In fact, he mentioned us two together. A band played into these instruments, calling itself "Victor Herbert's band," and I sued the talking machine company. That is what I got out of the company.

Mr. CAMERON. The gentleman misunderstood me. I have made no statement in regard to him, and I have no information in regard to him one way or the other.

Mr. CURRIER. He made no charge against you, Mr. Herbert.