Court: ‘This Land Is Your Land’ still private property
On Friday, Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land” avoided what had been shaping up as a growing trend affecting the copyright owners of old songs, as the publishers of “This Land” defeated a challenge against it.
In the case, a young musical group called Satorii sued the song’s publishers, Ludlow Music and the Richmond Organization, after paying $45.50 for a license to release a cover version of “This Land Is Your Land,” which Guthrie wrote in 1940. In their complaint, the group used a detailed timeline of decadesold paperwork and Guthrie’s own hand-decorated songbooks to argue that Guthrie had essentially forfeited his copyright to the song decades ago by failing to renew it properly. They asked for the song’s copyright to be declared invalid, which would have put “This Land” in the public domain. Because “This Land” is under copyright, the song must be licensed any time it is recorded, used in a film or performed in a commercial setting.
The case ended up hinging on legal details. Satorii, the challenger of the copyright, lost an important ruling last year. On Friday, Judge P. Kevin Castel of U.S. District Court in Manhattan did not reach a decision on whether the song deserved to keep its copyright because, he said, he didn’t have to. He ruled that there was no legal dispute for him to adjudicate: Satorii had already paid the license fee, and in exchange, the publisher had agreed to let Satorii do what it wanted with the song. The judge dismissed the case.
Mark Rifkin, a lawyer for Satorii, said in a statement: “We are disappointed with the court’s decision, which gave the defendants unfair veto power to stop this meritorious case from proceeding. We are considering how best to continue to pursue these important issues.”