Mr. DAVIS. Mr. Sousa, through his publishers, has tried in the various courts to have the word "writing" broadened, but he has failed to do so, and he now comes to you to do it. In no copyright act or law has there ever been introduced before--you will not find it anywhere--one word or clause or phrase, before this one, that covers mechanical devices. Mr. CHANEY. Under that word "writing" you want to exclude such people as Mr. Sousa entirely from its operation in respect to self-playing musical instruments? Mr. DAVIS. If you are going to work under the Constitution; yes. Mr. CHANEY. Then, is it not high time that we were giving it a little wider construction than that? Mr. DAVIS. I think it is rather late in the day, after we inventors have spent our lives at this art and created a new industry. I think you ought to have done it soon after 1789, if at all, and if the law had been passed then there is no inventor in the land that would have gone ahead developing this particular art. Mr. CAMPBELL. Why not, Mr. Davis? Mr. DAVIS. Because we would have been dominated by composers, as I have explained at great length. Mr. CAMPBELL. Mr. Sousa can not use your machine nor your process. Mr. DAVIS. But we would have gone into other fields or arts not dominated by composers. We would have left this art undeveloped. He may make use of machines if he can construct them with "writings" or musical tones and infringe only a remote correlative ethical right of the inventors. Mr. CAMPBELL. Well, now if there is a mercantile demand, a commercial demand, for your method of reproducing music, why would you not have gone into it for exactly the same reason? If Mr. Sousa's music, played upon your machine, meets a public demand, he must use your instrument just exactly the same as you use his music. Mr. CURRIER. But suppose there are half a dozen of these concerns and one of them, by an arrangement with the musical publishers of the country, gets control of all the copyrights? Mr. DAVIS. That is what they have done, sir. Mr. CURRIER. Then would the competing concerns be able to use their instruments at all? Mr. DAVIS. They might use, but could not sell, and over their pecuniary misery would weep alone. [Applause.] Mr. CAMPBELL. The proposition here is that this bill, as I understand it, does not affect what has already been done. It applies to the future. You all stand upon the same level, and that relates right back to the contractual rights of the parties. If Mr. Sousa desires to make a contract with some machine producing music independent from yours, why should his right to do so be restricted by us under the law? That is the question I would like to have you answer. Mr. DAVIS. Well, sir, I am not a lawyer---- Mr. CAMPBELL. No; but that is a practical question.