Two interesting recent discussions of Moral Rights have appeared in the Texas Law Review.
First, in a student note, Lindsey Mills (Moral Rights: Well-Intentioned Protection and Its Unintended Consequences) argues that “by taking away ownership rights that purchasers of artwork would otherwise have, [moral rights legislation] diminishes the economic value of the artwork in question and further, to the extent that artistic expression is deemed desirable, harms society as a whole. After weighing these interests against each other, she concludes that moral rights protection has no place in the United States, let alone as part of the Copyright Act.”
In a follow up, Prof. Robert Bird responds (Of Geese, Ribbons, and Creative Destruction: Moral Rights and Its Consequences) with his own “misgivings based on her discussions of a Canadian moral rights case and artistic destruction. Professor Bird concludes with an appeal to pragmatism in light of “artistic doomsday rhetoric” against moral rights protections in American law.”
