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 entitled to terminate the grant. Rather than adopting a simple rule allowing authors to decide who should be able to recapture their copyrights, Congress established a statutory succession scheme enumerating the parties who become entitled to terminate a grant of copyright rights following the death of the original author. The parties who are entitled to terminate a deceased author’s transfer of rights are:


 * In the case of an author survived by a spouse, but not by any children or grandchildren, the author’s surviving spouse holds the power to terminate the transfer;
 * In the case of an author survived by at least one child or grandchild, but not by a spouse, the author’s children share the termination rights equally, with the author’s grandchildren eligible to vote the shares of their deceased parents on a per stirpes basis;
 * In the case of an author survived both by a spouse and by at least one child or grandchild, the spouse holds fifty percent of the termination rights and the author’s children collectively hold the other fifty percent divided equally among them, with the same per stirpes rule for grandchildren; and
 * In the case of an author survived neither by a spouse nor by any children or grandchildren, the author’s executor, administrator, personal representative, or trustee enjoys the power to terminate grants of the deceased author’s copyright rights.

Termination causes the granted rights to revert to the persons listed in the statutory succession scheme.

Parties cannot opt out of the termination regime. The statute specifically provides that “[t]ermination of the grant may be effected notwithstanding any agreement to the contrary, including an agreement to make a will or to make any future grant.” Thus, every license or transfer of any