Artists get second chance to challenge copyright extension law

DENVER - Orchestra conductors, movie distributors and others who rely on works of art and music in the public domain will get another chance to challenge an act of Congress that extended some copyright protections.

A three-judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit of Appeals on Tuesday upheld a lower court's dismissal of a challenge to an act that extended copyright protections by 20 years, meaning music would be copyrighted for 70 years after an artist's death. But the court also revived a challenge of another act extending that protection to foreign works, some of which were in the public domain.

The court said the act altered "the traditional contours of copyright protection in a manner that implicates plaintiff's right to free expression."

"It's a fantastic victory," plaintiffs' attorney Lawrence Lessig said of the ruling. "We're confident that on remand we will convince the district court that Congress went too far in this case."

Under the Copyright Term Extension Act and the Uruguay Round Agreements Act passed in the 1990s, artists have to pay royalties to use or perform copyrighted works by foreign artists, including Sergei Prokofiev's "Peter and the Wolf."

In many cases, those costs are prohibitive, according to those the plaintiffs.

"We hold that plaintiffs have shown sufficient free expression interests in works removed from the public domain to require First Amendment scrutiny," the appeals court panel wrote.

The change was supported by the International Coalition for Copyright Protection, which filed a brief in support of the two acts. The coalition did not immediately return an e-mail seeking comment Tuesday night.

In dismissing the lawsuit, a lower court had ruled that the matter was settled in the 2003 Supreme Court decision Eldred v. Ashcroft. The appellate court ruled that decision left open the possibility of a challenge under the First Amendment.