deplorable. If the
suggestion of the Board of Trade were adopted, Canada would be in exactly
the same condition as the United States before the Chace Bill was passed.

The Canadian author, therefore, has obtained security in the vast market
of the United States, because of the proclamation of the President, based
on Lord Salisbury's satisfactory official assurance, that in Great Britain
and the British possessions, the law permitted to citizens of the United
States the benefit of copyright on substantially the same basis as to
British subjects. If Canadian authors, Mr. Seton-Thompson, Ralph Connor,
or Dr. Drummond, for example, comply with the provisions of the Chace
Bill, and print and publish in the United States contemporaneously with
the Canadian publication, they secure British and American copyright, with
all the protection of the local copyright laws of the two countries.

Now let us see how an American author, who does not copyright in England
but seeks to publish simultaneously in Canada and the United States, would
be treated in this country, were he to seek to copyright his book in
compliance with the provisions of our Canadian Act, an essential
requirement of which is printing in this country.

In 1875, the Canadian Parliament passed an Act giving copyright for
twenty-eight years from the date of recording, to any author of a book
domiciled in Canada or in any part of the British dominions _or being the
citizen of any country having an International Copyright Treaty with the
United Kingdom_. To secure such copyright the Act provides that the book
must be printed and published, or reprinted and republished in Canada,
_whether so published for the first time or contemporaneously with or
subsequently to the publication elsewhere_. This Act was reserved by the
Governor General. In the same year an Imperial Statute was passed
empowering Her Majesty in Council to assent to the reserved Act. On the
26th of October, 1875, the Royal assent was given to take effect from the
11th of December following. Just as United States Copyright Legislation
requires production in that country so the Canadian Act of 1875 provides,
as pointed out above, that to obtain Canadian copyright for a literary
work it must be produced in Canada.

The Canadian authorities have steadily declined to permit the registration
of copyright under the Canadian Copyright Act to citizens of the United
States, the ground of objection being, that the