Force Behind New Copyright Law - washingtonpost.com

Ms. Ringer believed, above all, that copyrights should protect the creative people in American life -- the authors, songwriters and performers whose work was too often printed, plagiarized or broadcast without permission. By 1955, she was writing papers and commissioning studies on how the nation's copyright laws should be revised.

For years, Ms. Ringer devoted much of her time to drafting a new, comprehensive copyright act and educating congressmen about why it was needed. Foreseeing the rise of the Internet, she inserted provisions into the law to protect authors from the unauthorized reproduction of their work, even by means not yet devised.

"The basic human rights of individual authors throughout the world," she warned in a 1975 speech, "are being sacrificed more and more on the altar of . . . the technological revolution."

Force Behind New Copyright Law - washingtonpost.com

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