Worldwide Reversion on U.S. Termination and 1909 Renewal: “Arise Under This Title” Has No Geographic Limit

Case: Vetter v. Resnik (5th Cir. Jan. 12, 2026) — Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit

I. Introduction

In Vetter v. Resnik, the Fifth Circuit confronted a long-simmering, high-stakes question for music publishing and legacy catalogs: does the U.S. statutory “termination” right (and the 1909 Act’s renewal “new estate”) recapture only domestic rights, or can it unwind a worldwide grant so that the author (or successor) becomes the exclusive owner “throughout the world”?

The dispute involves the 1962 song “Double Shot (Of My Baby’s Love)” (“Double Shot”), co-written by Cyril E. Vetter and Donald Smith. In 1963, both writers assigned worldwide rights to Windsong Music Publishers, Inc. (“Windsong”). Decades later, two events splintered and then reassembled ownership: (1) Smith died before renewal vested, causing his renewal rights to vest in his heirs; and (2) Vetter served a termination notice under 17 U.S.C. § 304(c), recapturing what he had granted.

Plaintiffs Cyril E. Vetter and Vetter Communications Corporation (collectively, the “Vetter Plaintiffs”) sought a declaratory judgment that they are the sole owners of the copyright in Double Shot “throughout the world.” Defendants Robert Resnik and Resnik Music Group (collectively, “Resnik”), successor to Windsong’s interests, insisted that termination and renewal recapture could not disturb “foreign rights,” invoking statutory text, prior district court decisions, treatise commentary, and international treaty principles. The district court granted summary judgment to the Vetter Plaintiffs; the Fifth Circuit affirmed in full.

II. Summary of the Opinion

The Fifth Circuit affirmed the declaratory judgment that the Vetter Plaintiffs collectively are the sole owners of Double Shot’s copyright “throughout the world.” It held:

• As to Vetter’s terminated grant: Termination under 17 U.S.C. § 304(c) recaptured Vetter’s interest without a geographic limitation; the phrase “arise under this title” is read as sourcing, not geography. Because Vetter’s rights arose under U.S. copyright law, termination was effective as to all rights covered by the worldwide grant, excluding only rights that arise under “any other Federal, State, or foreign laws.”
• As to Smith’s renewal rights acquired by VCC: The 1909 Act’s renewal provision (17 U.S.C. § 24 (1909)) created a “new estate” in renewal. Smith’s death before renewal caused his renewal rights to vest in his heirs (not Windsong), and Vetter Communications Corporation’s purchase of those rights yielded worldwide ownership of that renewal interest.
• As to counter-authorities: The court declined to follow Siegel v. Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., Clancy v. Jack Ryan Enterprises, Ltd., and dicta-style references in Fred Ahlert Music Corp. v. Warner/Chappell Music, Inc., and it rejected reliance on treatise views where inconsistent with statutory text, context, and purpose.
• As to treaties and territoriality: Resnik’s treaty-based objections were not sufficiently supported; the court found the decision reconcilable with national treatment and territoriality principles, emphasizing the ownership/vesting character of the dispute (as distinct from extraterritorial infringement regulation).

III. Analysis

A. Precedents Cited (and How They Shaped the Outcome)

1. Statutory-interpretation method and “ordinary meaning”

• Matter of Durand-Day and Matter of Imperial Petroleum Recovery Corp. — The court reiterated a text-first approach, emphasizing ordinary meaning and stopping when text is unambiguous.
• Niz-Chavez v. Garland — Cited for “ordinary meaning” framing in statutory interpretation.
• Carpenters Dist. Council of New Orleans & Vicinity v. Dillard Dep't Stores, Inc. — Reinforced plain-language primacy once text is clear.

These authorities provided the methodological backbone: the panel treated § 304(c)(6)(E) as primarily a textual question and used dictionary definitions of “arise” to frame the operative distinction as source-of-law rather than place-of-exploitation.

2. “Arise under” and federal jurisdiction analogies

• T.B. Harms Co. v. Eliscu (via Fifth Circuit’s own Goodman v. Lee) — Resnik invoked “arise under” jurisprudence from jurisdictional doctrine. The panel accepted that, even under that test, the dispute “arises under” the Copyright Act because it requires construction of the Act and implicates distinctive federal policy (termination rights).

The court used these cases defensively: to show that even the jurisdictional gloss does not help Resnik because the claim requires interpretation of § 304(c). But the panel’s key move was to decouple “arise under this title” from geography and anchor it in statutory source.

3. The Copyright Act’s “under this title” phrase and non-geographic reading

• Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. — Central contextual support. Interpreting “lawfully made under this title” in 17 U.S.C. § 109(a), the Supreme Court adopted a non-geographical meaning (“in accordance with” the Act) and stressed that the statute “says nothing about geography.” The Fifth Circuit analogized: “arise under this title” in § 304(c)(6)(E) similarly carries no inherent geographic limitation.
• Nat'l Ass'n of Mfrs. v. Dep't of Def. and Kucana v. Holder — Used to support the point that “under” is context-dependent (“chameleon” word).
• Maracich v. Spears and U.S. Nat'l Bank of Or. v. Indep. Ins. Agents of Am., Inc. — Supported whole-statute/contextual interpretation when a phrase has uncertain reach.
• Pulsifer v. United States (via Matter of Durand-Day) — Reinforced the presumption that identical statutory terms generally share a meaning across a statute.

This cluster did the heavy lifting against the “domestic-only” theory. By treating “under this title” as a familiar Copyright Act phrase often read non-geographically, the panel converted what some courts treated as a territorial carve-out into a sourcing rule: termination affects rights sourced in Title 17, not those sourced in “other” legal regimes.

4. Renewal rights, vesting, and the “new estate” doctrine

• Stewart v. Abend — A keystone for renewal vesting: when an author dies before the renewal term, the assignee holds only an “unfulfilled expectancy,” and renewal rights vest in statutory successors. The Fifth Circuit leveraged Stewart for the conceptual structure (renewal as a “second chance” and “new estate”), but rejected Resnik’s attempt to read Stewart as silently domestic-only.
• Miller Music Corp. v. Charles N. Daniels, Inc. — Cited in Stewart and relied upon here to confirm that the author’s death before renewal diverts renewal rights to executor/heirs notwithstanding prior assignment of renewal rights.
• Fred Fisher Music Co. v. M. Witmark & Sons — Appears in a footnote regarding whether a later writing was necessary; the Fifth Circuit agreed it was not at issue because parties agreed Vetter’s renewal interest went to Windsong.

These cases supplied the doctrinal mechanism by which Smith’s heirs (and thus VCC) owned Smith’s renewal share. The Fifth Circuit then made a further move: nothing in the renewal statute’s text suggests the “new estate” is geographically partial; therefore, the renewed estate is not inherently U.S.-only.

5. Cases Resnik cited to impose a domestic-only rule (and why the Fifth Circuit rejected them)

• Siegel v. Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc. — The Fifth Circuit treated this out-of-circuit district court decision as heavily treatise-dependent and inconsistent with the Fifth Circuit’s text/context/purpose reading of § 304(c)(6)(E).
• Clancy v. Jack Ryan Enterprises, Ltd. — Rejected as largely derivative of Siegel and similar treatise reliance.
• Fred Ahlert Music Corp. v. Warner/Chappell Music, Inc. — Distinguished as not deciding the precise geographic-scope question; its “domestic rights” remark was treated as thin, citation-only dicta-like support.

6. Treaties, national treatment, and territoriality (supporting authorities)

• Golan v. Holder — Used to describe the Berne Convention’s centrality and the national treatment principle.
• Bridgeman Art Libr., Ltd. v. Corel Corp. — Cited for the proposition that foreign nationals can seek protection under the Copyright Act even when the “source” lies abroad, reinforcing the idea that rights can be protected under U.S. law while recognized internationally in practice.

7. Extraterritoriality in infringement vs. ownership

• Impression Prods., Inc. v. Lexmark Intern, Inc., Geophysical Serv., Inc. v. TGS-NOPEC Geophysical Co., and Subafilms, Ltd. v. MGM-Pathe Commc'ns Co. — The court acknowledged these as extraterritoriality/infringement authorities but found them minimally instructive because this case is about ownership/vesting and termination effects, not imposing U.S. infringement liability on wholly foreign conduct.
• EEOC v. Arabian Am. Oil Co. — Cited in the renewal portion for the general presumption against extraterritoriality, while leaving room to argue it has limited force in the renewal/ownership setting.
• Itar-Tass Russian News Agency v. Russian Kurier, Inc. — Raised by the Vetter Plaintiffs as a choice-of-law framework. The Fifth Circuit found it inapposite because it addressed initial ownership and expressly reserved assignment issues (which are central here).

8. Other supportive Fifth Circuit summary judgment and standard-of-review authorities

• Sanders v. Christwood and Burell v. Prudential Ins. Co. of Am. — Provided standard de novo review and Rule 56 framing.

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B. Legal Reasoning

1. The court’s core interpretive move: “arise under this title” is about source, not geography

Resnik’s primary textual hook was 17 U.S.C. § 304(c)(6)(E): termination “affects only those rights covered by the grant that arise under this title” and “in no way affects rights arising under any other Federal, State, or foreign laws.” Resnik read this as a territorial line: U.S. rights revert; foreign rights do not.

The Fifth Circuit rejected that premise. It read “arise” (ordinary meaning: “originate from” / “stem from”) as a sourcing concept. Under that reading:

• Termination reaches rights whose legal origin is Title 17 (the U.S. Copyright Act).
• Termination does not reach rights whose legal origin is “any other Federal, State, or foreign laws.”

Crucially, the panel found no explicit geographic limit in the text. Because the 1963 Assignment granted “exclusive rights … throughout the world” under U.S. copyright, and because the rights Vetter granted were rights “arising under” Title 17, the termination unwound that worldwide grant as a matter of U.S. law.

2. Contextual reinforcement: Kirtsaeng and the non-geographic use of “under this title”

Even accepting arguendo that “under this title” might be ambiguous, the Fifth Circuit leaned on the Supreme Court’s approach in Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: when Congress uses “under this title” in the Copyright Act, it often signals compliance with the Act, not a geographical boundary. This was not a mechanical import of Kirtsaeng but an interpretive analogy: if “lawfully made under this title” was non-geographic in § 109(a), then “arise under this title” in § 304(c)(6)(E) is naturally read non-geographically too—especially where Congress did not add territorial words.

3. Purpose: the termination right as a “second chance” against unremunerative transfers

The court’s purposive analysis relied on the Copyright Act’s termination rationale reflected in the House Report: termination is meant to counter authors’ unequal bargaining positions and provide a practical “second look” once the market value is known. A domestic-only termination, in the face of an expressly worldwide grant, would (in the court’s view) deliver only “half of the apple,” frustrating the remedial design. The panel also credited amici’s industry-norm point: contractual reversions often return all rights, and the industry routinely operationalizes worldwide rights management around U.S. termination.

4. Renewal: the 1909 Act’s text has no geographic carve-out, and its purpose favors full restoration

For Smith’s half, the dispute turned on renewal vesting under the Copyright Act of 1909. Smith died before renewal, so under Stewart v. Abend (citing Miller Music Corp. v. Charles N. Daniels, Inc.), the earlier grant of renewal rights to Windsong did not vest as to Smith; instead, Smith’s heirs owned the renewal rights. Vetter Communications Corporation later purchased those heirs’ renewal rights.

Resnik argued that “renewal and extension of the copyright … for a further term” should be read as U.S.-only because only the U.S. had this bifurcated term. The Fifth Circuit treated that as an atextual limitation: the renewal provision contains no territorial qualifier. It paired that textual point with Stewart’s purposive framing: renewal exists to give the author (or family) a “new estate” and a second chance at fair remuneration. On the panel’s logic, that policy is undermined if renewal confers only a domestically exploitable slice where the original grant and the commercial reality were worldwide.

5. Territoriality and treaties: the panel distinguishes ownership effects from extraterritorial infringement regulation

Resnik’s extraterritoriality argument was strongest rhetorically: foreign exploitation is typically regulated by foreign law, and U.S. copyright law is presumed territorial. But the court narrowed the relevance of that principle by characterizing the case as one about ownership of an intangible property asset, not an attempt to apply U.S. infringement remedies to wholly foreign conduct.

On treaties, the court found Resnik’s “multiple separate copyrights” theory underdeveloped and not adequately supported. It also reasoned that the result could be reconciled with:

• National treatment (via Golan v. Holder): recognition across member states does not require slicing a U.S.-granted worldwide interest into non-communicating country-by-country estates for purposes of U.S. termination and renewal vesting.
• Territoriality (via Impression Prods., Inc. v. Lexmark Intern, Inc. and Geophysical Serv., Inc. v. TGS-NOPEC Geophysical Co.): those are principally infringement/reach cases; the panel was not persuaded they dictate a domestic-only ownership reversion rule.

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C. Impact

1. Licensing leverage and chain-of-title auditing

The decision strengthens authors’ and heirs’ leverage in renegotiations by recognizing that a “worldwide” grant can revert worldwide upon termination/renewal, not merely within U.S. territory. For distributors, studios, labels, and publishers, it elevates the importance of chain-of-title audits: a termination notice (or a co-author death before renewal) may alter not only U.S. licensing but global licensing posture—at least as a matter of U.S. declaratory ownership.

2. Potential friction with prior district court approaches; likelihood of further appellate development

The opinion openly declines to follow Siegel and Clancy, decisions often cited for a domestic-only view. Because those are nonbinding district court decisions and Fred Ahlert Music Corp. did not squarely decide the geographic-scope issue, the Fifth Circuit treated the field as open. Nevertheless, the opinion increases the chance of inter-circuit tension if other circuits adopt or reaffirm a domestic-only rule in a square holding. That posture could invite Supreme Court interest if a clear split matures.

3. Drafting and transactional implications

Parties drafting grants of rights may attempt to:

• Clarify which rights are intended to be sourced in U.S. law versus foreign law (though the enforceability and practical meaning of such sourcing clauses may be contested).
• Structure foreign exploitation through separate foreign-law instruments (potentially making “rights arising under … foreign laws” arguments more concrete).
• Price termination and renewal risk into catalog acquisitions, especially where worldwide rights were historically bundled into a single U.S.-law agreement.

4. Litigation strategy: declaratory judgment forum and remedies framing

The Fifth Circuit’s ownership-focused reasoning suggests litigants may frame disputes as ownership/vesting and contract-chain questions rather than extraterritorial infringement claims. That framing can shift doctrinal terrain away from Subafilms-style limitations and toward statutory text about reversion and vesting.

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IV. Complex Concepts Simplified

1. What is “termination” under 17 U.S.C. § 304(c)?

Termination is a statutory “do-over” for certain old grants. For pre-1978 grants covering works still in their first or renewal term as of January 1, 1978, § 304(c) lets authors (or statutory successors) terminate a prior transfer after a set window, so ownership of the granted rights “reverts” to the terminating party. It exists because authors often sold rights early for low sums before a work’s value was known.

2. What does § 304(c)(6)(E) mean by “arise under this title”?

In this opinion, “arise under this title” means rights that originate from Title 17 (the U.S. Copyright Act), as opposed to rights that originate from “any other Federal, State, or foreign laws.” Resnik argued this phrase creates a U.S.-only geographic limit; the court treated it as a source-of-law limit.

3. What was the 1909 Act “renewal term” and the “new estate” idea?

Under the Copyright Act of 1909, copyright had two terms: an initial term and a renewal term. The renewal term was not just a time extension; it was treated as a second, potentially reallocated ownership “estate.” If an author died before renewal vested, the renewal rights vested in statutory successors (heirs/executor), even if the author had previously purported to assign renewal rights. That is the “new estate” concept described in Stewart v. Abend.

4. Territoriality and the presumption against extraterritoriality (why the court downplayed it here)

Territoriality commonly means U.S. copyright infringement law generally does not regulate purely foreign acts of infringement. But this case was framed as a question of ownership and reversion under U.S. statutes, not as an attempt to impose U.S. infringement liability for conduct occurring abroad. That distinction mattered to the panel’s willingness to treat termination/renewal as producing a worldwide ownership declaration.

5. National treatment (Berne/UCC) in plain terms

National treatment means member countries agree to treat foreign authors like their own nationals for copyright protection. Resnik argued worldwide reversion would improperly advantage U.S. authors; the court found the treaties and record did not compel that conclusion and viewed the outcome as reconcilable with treaty principles.

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V. Conclusion

Vetter v. Resnik is a significant Fifth Circuit statement on the geographic scope of U.S. copyright reversion mechanisms. Reading § 304(c)(6)(E) through text, context (Kirtsaeng), and purpose, the court held that termination can unwind a worldwide grant without being artificially confined to U.S.-only exploitation. Likewise, applying the 1909 Act’s renewal “new estate” doctrine (Stewart v. Abend; Miller Music Corp. v. Charles N. Daniels, Inc.), it confirmed that renewal vesting in heirs (and their transferees) is not textually or purposively limited to domestic rights.

The decision strengthens authors’ and heirs’ “second chance” leverage and will likely influence how catalog deals are priced, drafted, and litigated—especially where older agreements bundled “worldwide” rights into a single U.S.-law grant.