John McLean

“ This limitation has been totally disregarded by the learned judge of the Circuit Court, who adopted the views of the counsel for the plaintiffs, who 'insisted that they were entitled to recover fifty cents for every sheet of such matter which had been published, or procured to be published, by the defendant, whether the same were proved to have been found in the defendant's possession or not,' and so decided and instructed the jury. ”

“ And yet Congress carefully adheres to the old penalty, limiting it to the sheets found in the offender's possession, although they must have seen the alteration made in the British statute, and known that the effect would be to extend the penalty to all sheets printed or imported. Perhaps Congress thought the penalty of fifty cents a sheet was so large, that it ought to be limited to the sheets found in defendant's possession. ”

“ Again, it might be that a person who had unintentionally violated a copyright by the publication of a book might, upon discovering that his publication was illegal, destroy the whole edition, and so relieve himself from the penalty. But according to the decision of the Circuit Court, he would still remain liable. Nay, if he were even to give the whole edition to the author of the protected work, he would still, on the principle of this decision, remain liable to this penalty.
These are some of the reasons which might be given for this limitation of the penalty ”