Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2015 July 24

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July 24

US copyright formalities, pre-craziness

Before the Copyright Act of 1976, were registration and deposit mandatory? I'm holding a 1940-published book that's in the public domain (it doesn't appear in the renewals database), but I'm wondering if it were ever copyrighted. "All rights reserved; copyright 1940" are given in the normal place, along with the author's name, but I can't find evidence that it was registered. In such a case, did it pass into the public domain in 1940 or in 1968? Nyttend (talk) 02:24, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

My reading of Cornell's excellent copyright table would suggest that a work first published in the United States with a copyright notice did not require registration to be protected, at least after 1923. Someguy1221 (talk) 03:17, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Wire transfer with different beneficiary bank and receiving bank

For some incoming wire transfer instruction (e.g. [1]) I see the recipient listing a "beneficiary bank" and a separate "receiving bank" where the two banks are completely different entities and could even be in separate countries. Is this common around the world? Or is this just a North American thing? Most banks can't seem to hand this type of situation.

For the "normal" case where there's only one bank listed in the wire transfer instruction, would that bank be considered the "beneficiary bank" or the "receiving bank"? My other car is a cadr (talk) 03:39, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

This one[2] is even crazier with three different banks, two in Canada and one in the US. My other car is a cadr (talk) 04:10, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

See Correspondent account - it's not at all uncommon to have multiple institutions involved in international transfers (both of your examples involve the US and Canada). In your "normal" case, the answer is both - since there's no other insitution involved, then the insitution receiving the funds is also the beneficiary of the funds. Most wire forms will probably label that bank as the beneficiary in this situation, but both terms would apply. Also, I disagree with your characterization that most banks can't handle these situations. It may be uncommon for most staff in a typical retail bank branch to encounter, but the vast majority of banks have the capability of handling complex wires like this. I manage a retail branch for a regional American bank - such a wire landing on my desk would involve a phone call to the wire department and reading up on some procedures, but it could definitely be done. 12.71.77.125 (talk) 13:36, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Ethiopia: a landlocked nation

Does Ethiopia regard its lack of harbors, ports and coastline to be an issue similar to Bolivia? None of its border disputes with Eritrea are related to coastline territory. Is the nation perfectly fine without a coastline? --68.116.114.141 (talk) 17:00, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

I don't think it is "perfectly fine" without a coastline. At least judging by this or this. If you Google "Ethiopia landlocked problem" you'll get more stuff. Here you can see for example views expressed in a forum. Contact Basemetal here 17:13, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Even before Eritrea achieved independence, Djibouti was the main cargo port for Ethiopia. So the issue is not solely linked to bilateral difficulties with Eritrea. --Xuxl (talk) 10:24, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

By-election results

Are there any online sources for UK Parliamentary by-election results?

JASpencer (talk) 18:41, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia? AndrewWTaylor (talk) 19:17, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Also List of United Kingdom by-elections (1979–present). There are a lot of resources available at www.parliament.uk By-elections, of which UK Election Statistics: 1918-2012 seems to be the most pertinent. Alansplodge (talk) 20:43, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for the responses. The issue I'm having is that I'm writing articles about by-elections and there are a lot of by-election results that are uncited which I'd like to confirm and cite. So are there any sites that have these results? 08:54, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

Does this provide you with what you're looking for?--Phil Holmes (talk) 09:41, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for that, but I'm looking for individual breakdowns like this wayback page. JASpencer (talk) 09:28, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

I've created a list from 1945 to 79 here and here for 79 to 97. JASpencer (talk) 21:56, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

At What Point Does a Treaty Become Invalid or Void Because It's Terms Are Secret or Unwritten?

I had always assumed that the Law of Treaties was a body of international law containing well-understood and clearly-defined requirements for the formation of valid treaties. Recent controversy over the treaty negotiated between the United States of America and its allies with the Islamic Republic of Iran have led me to ask:

1.) Is it possible for a treaty to be valid if it contains provisions not fully disclosed or understood by all parties to the treaty? 2.) Is it fundamentally necessary that all portions of a treaty be in writing?Honeyman2010 (talk) 23:31, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

(1) First, a point of clarification: the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action is not a treaty in the U.S. law sense of the word. Not all international agreements are treaties in the U.S. constitutional law sense. The JCPOA is an executive agreement. (See testimony of David Albright, President of the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS)).

(2) See our (woefully unreferenced) article on secret treaty. Prior to the First World War, such treaties were relatively common. (Indeed, such treaties were one of the causes of World War I).

One of Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points (1918) was the abolition of secret treaties, and generally the institution of public, open diplomacy. This eventually came to pass with Article 18 of the Covenant of the League of Nations, which required members of the League to register agreements with the League secretariat: "Every treaty or international engagement entered into hereafter by any Member of the League shall be forthwith registered with the Secretariat and shall as soon as possible be published by it. No such treaty or international engagement shall be binding until so registered."

This rule is preserved in the present day via the United Nations - see Article 102 of the United Nations Charter: 1. Every treaty and every international agreement entered into by any Member of the United Nations after the present Charter comes into force shall as soon as possible be registered with the Secretariat and published by it. 2. No party to any such treaty or international agreement which has not been registered in accordance with the provisions of paragraph 1 of this Article may invoke that treaty or agreement before any organ of the United Nations. The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties also entrenches the registration/depository system.

(3) As to whether an oral agreement can be formed and be as binding as a written agreement: theoretically, yes, see Article 3 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties: The fact that the present Convention does not apply to international agreements concluded between States and other subjects of international law or between such other subjects of international law, or to international agreements not in written form, shall not affect: (a) the legal force of such agreements... So foreign minister X could make a binding oral agreement with foreign minister Y. In reality, all serious agreements intended to be binding will be reduced to a formal writing, pored over by diplomats. Even a preliminary agreement is reduced to writing (see Modus vivendi).

(4) As to situations when a treaty might become void or invalid: see Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties articles 46-53, which outline such situations. Article 48, on error, might be what you're thinking of. Neutrality^talk 03:26, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

Who will step up to improve the "woefully unreferenced" article on secret treaty? -- Paulscrawl (talk) 05:19, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

Excellent answer from Neutrality. But we do have an article on the Ihlen Declaration, where the World Court ruled that foreign minister X did make a binding oral agreement with foreign minister Y.John Z (talk) 05:32, 26 July 2015 (UTC)