To the Editor of Liberty:

Mr. Yarros was once frank enough to express with regard to myself the most exalted contempt for debate with an individual who was — well, who was so completely the reverse of everything that Mr. Yarros manifestly is. And notwithstanding that since that time my comrade has several times unguardedly permitted himself to notice my existence and even my intellect, I am too well aware of his settled convictions, not only concerning myself but indeed the majority of his contemporaries, to be thereby deceived. Now, I have too great a respect for the rights and benefits of the boycott, in all its degrees, not to meet any man half-way who proposes to boycott myself. I therefore hasten to assure Mr. Yarros, if he should happen to read this, that what I am about to say was not written with any desire to provoke him to discussion. It is addressed to the general reader of Liberty, nad merely describes a mental debate suggested by reading his Land and Ideas as Property.

And of course ideas so crude, not to say idiotic, expressed in terms so unscientific, will be beneath his notice.

Having premised so much by way of a sop to Cerberus, you and I, dear reader, are free, perhaps, to amuse ourselves in our own childlike way.

Now, I have a habit of keeping a Devil’s Advocate, and, whenever I hear arguments that conflict with my convictions, I appoint him to plead their cause before me in opposition to my Own Advocate. The Devil’s Advocate is a good fellow, who amuses me greatly, and very often convinces me, and obliges me to give sentence in his favor.

The argument that he this time placed before me was to this effect: May it please the Court!—If a man first discovers, occupies, and uses a certain train of thought, expressed concretely in a certain form,—a book, for instance,—I claim that, by reason of such occupation and priority of discovery, all other men are as rightfully excluded as they would be from a piece of land which the first discoverer occupied in usufruct. As a farmer is entitled to the whole product of his labor on his land, even so is an author entitled to the whole product of his labor on his domain of ideas. Therefore copyright is justified by usufruct, and it is just as clearly an invasion for one man to copy another man’s book as it would be for one farmer to copy—to— Here it appeared to the Court that the D. A. was confused or had forgotten something; however, after a momentary pause, he looked complacently around and sat down as if he had made a good finish.

To this my Own Advocate promptly replied: Your Honor!—This question can only be decided by reference to the principle of equal liberty. If A takes up and occupies a bit of land sufficient only for his maintenance, it is manifest that B cannot occupy, or attempt to occupy, the same without invasion. But this is a matter of usufruct, and not at all of copyright. The fact that A occupies and uses a piece of land prevents B from occupying the same land, but there is nothing in equity to prevent his taking up a similar piece of unoccupied land and farming it in precisely the same manner. This is imitation, not invasion. There is nothing in the agricultural ethics of any country to prevent B, who is a good imitator, from copying all the original experiments of A, who is a good inventor, exactly. It is recognized among the unsophisticated sons of the soil that B has as good a right to use his faculty of imitation as A his faculty of origination, and adjudged that B’s doing so does A no harm. Now, your Honor, I claim that it was a sudden perception of this that caused my opponent to break down. He knows there is no question of copyright among farmers. They all copy. And, your Honor, first discovery has nothing to do with just ownership anyhow. It is not the man who first discovers a bee-tree, but the man who first chops his mark on it, who owns it, according to the law of the woods. Not the hunter who first sees the deer, but he who kills it, has the venison. The man who first finds a diamond and leaves it as a thing of no value does not own it, but the finder who picks it up and polishes or sets it. It is labor that gives a valid title to possession, and abandonment annuls even that. But all this again, your Honor, is a matter of ownership, and not of copyright. Discoveries can be repeated—that is, copied—indefinitely without invasion. Ferocious navigators, indifferent alike to usufruct and liberty, have indeed set the example of claiming for themselves, or their tyrants, the new countries they discovered, people and all (a poor precedent that for a teacher of liberty), but I never heard that they forbade the imitation of the act of discovery. And indeed, your Honor, I think none of these monopolists of copyright care anything about the act of imitation; it is the reward of that act that they plot to steal away. They are like the medical monopolists,—anybody may prescribe, but only the regulars may take pay. Not the patient, but the doctor’s pocket is protected.

Truth, from which ideas are derived, air, water, sunlight, land, are all alike in this,—that everyone may use what he needs of that which is not in use. It is only in the domains of the first and the last that monopoly has often been attempted, and always with disastrous results. And in all these universal human experience has proved that imitation, free and frequent, is of inestimable value. Usufruct never forbids it. The knowledge that is in my brain is exclusively mine, but another may imitate every act in its acquisition and possess similar knowledge. Another may not attempt to inhale the air which I am inhaling without invasion, but the unoccupied atmosphere is free to him, and he may imitate every act of my breathing. It is the same with water, light, and, as I have before shown, land. I cannot absorb the same sun-rays, I cannot drink the same water, I cannot occupy the same position in space, I cannot possess the same land, I cannot perform the same acts as my fellow; but I may always, where nature fails not, do acts similar to his, and in so doing vindicate my own rights and invade not his. Nor is there any miracle or break in the natural sequence when we come to mental function or literary work. The universality of law is the first dictum of science. I cannot think another man’s thoughts, or write his book, but here, as everywhere, I may imitate him and do no wrong. Of course, this justification does not include the addition of falsification. Falsification is justified only when used defensively against invasion. All other deception is itself invasive, for all inoffensive men have a right to know the truth they need to use. B has a right to copy A’s book provided he copies the author’s name along with the rest. He has no right to print on the title-page, This is B’s book, but he has a right to say, This is B’s copy of A’s book, and in so doing fulfils all just claims of honor.

It is just as great tyranny to force all men to be original as to force all to be alike.

The arguments of my Own Advocate appeared to me so self-evidenced, and attested by analogy and common sense, that I unhesitatingly gave sentence in his favor.

J. Wm. Lloyd