[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 152 (Thursday, November 12, 1998)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E2308-E2309]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                SONNY BONO COPYRIGHT TERM EXTENSION ACT

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. JOHN CONYERS, JR.

                              of michigan

                    in the house of representatives

                      Thursday, November 12, 1998

  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, on October 9, 1998, I inserted a brief 
statement in the Record regarding S. 505, the Sonny Bono Copyright Term 
Extension Act.
  In my statement, I expressed strong support for the extension of the 
statutory term of copyright protection. I neglected to note how 
appropriate it was to name the bill after the late Sonny Bono. Although 
we on the Judiciary Committee are now fortunate to have Mary Bono 
amongst our ranks, I would like the record to reflect how much we miss 
Sonny. Members of Congress have very few bills named after them, and 
the Copyright Term Extension Act is a very fitting tribute to Sonny.
  But while I am happy to have honored Sonny in such a manner, I am not 
happy about the gamesmanship that accompanied its passage. The 
Republican leadership--at the behest of certain large restaurants who 
object to paying royalties to musical creators whose music is performed 
in their establishments--kidnapped term extension and used it as a 
hostage. To liberate the hostage, we were forced to pay a high ransom 
by attaching a second bill--misnamed ``fairness in music licensing''--
that deprives just compensation to songwriters and composers, 
particularly those who write as individuals and small businesses.
  In my statement, I referred to the combined bill as a ``compromise,'' 
so I want to clarify my use of that term. I used the word compromise 
not to indicate that the substance of the music licensing provision was 
arrived at through a fair negotiation between the restaurants and 
musical creators. Rather, I used the term compromise in a procedural 
sense, to merely indicate that something had happened to allow S. 505 
to pass the Senate, to come to the House floor, and to be acceptable to 
a large number of legislators. I used the word ``compromise'' as ``a 
consequence of majority decision making'' to paraphrase a former House 
number, Abner Mikva.
  I did not mean to imply that the parties who ultimately must pay the 
ransom--the hundreds of thousands of songwriters, composers, music 
publishers and the performing rights organizations, BMI, ASCAP and 
SESAC, that so ably represent their interests--were willing signatories 
to the compromise. To the contrary, they were the hostages. They will 
now pay the price. They are the victims of the legislation and it would 
be unfair to characterize them, as we often do to victims of crime, as 
willing participants.
  If Sonny Bono had been here, he would have reminded us of these 
facts. His reminder

[[Page E2309]]

would probably not have saved the hostages, but he would have 
instructed us, with wit and humor, about what is right and what is 
wrong. He would have told us that we were wrong to pass the fairness in 
music licensing legislation.

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