- 27 -
See 141 Cong. Rec. S16,086-S16,087 (daily ed. Oct. 27, 1995)
(statement of Sen. Hatch); 140 Cong. Rec. H3428 (daily ed. May 17,
1994) (statement of Rep. Lantos). The Department of the Treasury
maintained that an “expansion” of the scope of the FSC rules
required legislative action. 140 Cong. Rec. H3428 (daily ed. May
17, 1994) (letter from Secretary of the Treasury Bentsen to Rep.
Lantos (May 6, 1994)). Legislation was introduced to expressly
include the sale or licensing of computer software for use outside
the United States, even when accompanied by a right to reproduce,
within the definition of FSC export property. See 141 Cong. Rec.
S16,086-S16,087 (daily ed. Oct. 27, 1995). This legislation was not
enacted; thus, section 927(a)(2)(B) remained intact.
D. The Parties’ Positions
The threshold question before us is whether copyrights in
computer software fall within the parenthetical. According to
respondent:
The parenthetical describes the narrow
subset of copyright rights that Congress
intended to “save” from the general rule
excluding intangibles from export property. The
parenthetical describes only copyright rights in
motion pictures and sound recordings. The
parenthetical was not intended to, and does not,
refer to copyrights fixed on various media
without regard to the nature of the copyrighted
content.
Thus, respondent maintains that “the parenthetical refers to
particular kinds of content fixed on the media that are mentioned in
the parenthetical, and any similar media that might be invented in
Page: Previous 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 NextLast modified: May 25, 2011