Stewart v. Abend, 495 U.S. 207

Sandra Day O'Connor -
"It Had to Be Murder" published in 1924 in Dime Detective magazine, written by Cornell Woolrich.  Woolrich assigned magazine publication rights to Popular Publications, Inc.  Woolrich assigned movie rights and promised to renew and re-assign the copyright after 28 years.  Woolrich died before renewing and the executor of his estate assigned the renewed copyrights to Abend.  Jimmy Stewart and several other people, after obtaining the right to make a movie from Woolrich, made a movie called "Rear Window" based the the story "It Had to Be Murder".  After being paid off in the initial release of the movie, Abend (a subsequent owner the renewal rights of the story) sued when the movie was distributed in 35mm and 16mm.

Held:
1)  Any assignment of renewal rights made during the original term is void if the author dies before the renewal period.
2)  Assignee may continue to use the original work only if the author's successor transfers the renewal rights to the assignee.
3)  like all purchasers of contingent interests, Stewart took subject to the possibility that the contingency may not occur.
4)  Congress would not have stated explicitly in 17 USC sec. 304(c)(6)(A) that, at the end of the renewal term, the owner of the rights in the pre-existing work may not terminate use rights in existing derivative works unless congress had assumed that the owner continued to hold the right to sue for infringement even after incorporation of the pre-existing work into the derivative work.
5)  The argument that this gives original works' owners too much economic advantage which leads to the stifling of creation of art, is an argument better directed to congress.