At first, a request for royalties by the estate of Nazi propagandist Goebbels was considered a joke by counsel for Random House. But the publisher now finds itself in the middle of a legal controversy after releasing a biography about the notorious World War 2 Nazi, which largely draws from Goebbels’s diaries.
Joseph Goebbels acted as the minister of propaganda to Adolf Hitler during the German Nazi regime. The biography outlines that his propaganda prowess supported Hitler’s power, prolonged the Second World War, and fuelled hate and mistrust towards Jewish individuals. From 1924-1945, Goebbels meticulously recorded his strategic plans for the Nazi regime in his diaries. Random House initially agreed to pay a royalty fee for their use but later recanted, arguing it had objections to paying a war criminal’s estate.
Random House presents two arguments for its position, namely that (1) the claim is immoral because the estate wants to benefit financially from Goebbels’s work, and that (2) the government ought to own the copyright to historically controversial works. The author of the biography, Peter Longerich, extensively quotes from Goebbels’s diaries and infers about Goebbels’s personality traits from the their contents. Longerich states in the book that the diaries are “the basis of [the] biography and one of the chief sources for histories of the Third Reich”. However, they are copyright protected until the end of 2015, and claim to be owned by Cordula Schacht, daughter of Hitler’s former minister of economics.
Random House explains that the diaries should be exempt from copyright protection due to their lack of morality. In most countries copyright is content neutral. This means that copyright protection persists irrespective of the work’s quality or morality. For example, section 5 of the Canadian Copyright Act states that copyright subsists in “every original literary, dramatic, musical and artistic work” [Emphasis added]. While this supports freedom of expression, it also protects material that some may regard as immoral. Certain countries indeed consider morality and public decency when determining whether a work is copyright protected. For example, until last year pornography was unprotected in Taiwan due to its indecent nature. Recently, their IP court ruled that some types of offshore pornographic videos may be copyright protected. Therefore, morality may influence whether a work is copyright protected in some countries.
Furthermore, Longerich expressed that vital historical documents should not be protected by copyright. The diaries are important because they describe the beginning, success and eventual demise of the Nazi regime. Goebbels recorded and drafted many of his propaganda ideas within these documents, which present an invaluable insider perspective. Counsel for Random House also argues that Goebbels intended for the government to own the copyright, and challenges Schacht’s claim to the documents. Similarly, the copyright to Hitler’s ‘Mein Kampf’ belongs to the Bavarian State in Germany. Dresen’s argument that the copyright should belong to the government has merit because it is unclear if and how Goebbels transferred his rights to Schacht’s family before his death. No contracts or known records that could indicate this transfer survived the war. And, it may be more appropriate for governments to own copyrights to historically controversial works, so that financial benefits can proceed to charitable causes.
Copyright law necessarily balances user rights with author rights. This bargain allows an author to share their ideas in exchange for economic rights. Subsequently, the author attains the right of ownership, and the right to exploit the work as an article of commerce. Therefore, although Random House maintains that it is immoral to financially benefit from this literature and that the government should own the copyright, it is unclear whether its two arguments will succeed.
Last month, the Munich Higher Regional Court ruled in favour of Schacht, stating the estate was owed royalties for the use of the diaries. However, Random House is appealing this decision because it strongly believes that nobody should benefit financially from the works of war criminals. It will be up to the German Supreme Court to decide whether morality has any influence on German copyright laws.
Gosia Piasecka is an IPilogue editor and a JD Candidate at Thompson Rivers University Faculty of Law.