as new roads could be made if the tolls on old ones were too high; and yet it is so well understood that the making of roads does carry with it monopoly power, that the rates of charge are always limited, and so limited as not to permit the road-makers to obtain a profit disproportioned to the amount of their investments.  In the case of authors there can be no such limitation.  They must have monopoly powers, and the law therefore very wisely limits the time within which they may be exercised, as in the other case it limits the price that may be charged.  In France, the prices to be paid to dramatic authors are fixed by law, and all who pay may play; and if this could be done in regard to all literary productions, permitting all who paid to print, much of the difficulty relative to copyright would be removed; but this course of operation would be in direct opposition to the views of publishers who advocate this treaty on the ground that it would add to “the security and respectability of the trade.”  They would prefer to pay for the copyright of every foreign book, because it would bring with it monopoly prices and monopoly profits, both of which would need to be paid by the consumers of books.  To the paper-maker, printer, and bookbinder, called upon to supply one thousand of a book for the few, where before they had supplied ten thousand for the many, it would be small consolation to know that they were thereby building up the fortunes of two or three large publishing houses that had obtained a monopoly of the business of republication, and were thus adding to the “security and respectability of the trade.”  As little would probably be derived from this source by the father of a family who found that he had now to pay five dollars for what before had cost but one, and must therefore endeavor to borrow, where before he had been accustomed to buy, the books required for the amusement and instruction of his children.

Our State of New Jersey levies a transit duty of eight cents per ton on all the merchandise that crosses it.  Had the imposition of this tax been accompanied by a law permitting all who chose to make roads, no one would have complained of it, as it would have been little more than a fair tax on the property of the railroad and other companies.  Unfortunately, however, the course was different.  To the company that collected it was granted a monopoly of the power of transportation, and that power has been so used that while the State received but eight cents the transporters charged three, five, six, and eight dollars for work that should have been done for one.  The position in which the authors are necessarily placed is precisely the one in which our State has voluntarily placed itself.  To enable them to collect their dues, some person or persons must have a monopoly of publication, and they must and will collect five, ten, and often twenty dollars for every one that reaches the author.  The Union would gain largely by paying into our treasury