Z:gnu-www-ja-eldred-amicus--b99aef-When the Copyright Act of 1709/en

When the Copyright Act of 1709, the famous &ldquo;Statute of Anne,&rdquo; was framed, the drafters insisted on a limited term far more stringent than authors, including John Locke, had proposed; they adopted the fourteen-year limit from the Statute of Monopolies. See Mark Rose, Authors and Owners: The Invention of Copyright 44-47 (1993). The term provided by the Statute of Anne, fourteen years with a renewal of fourteen years if the author survived the first term, was adopted by First Congress in the Copyright Act of 1790. See Copyright Act of 1709, 8 Anne, c. 19; Act of May 31, 1790, 1 Stat. 124-25.