What if that were true? How many works that we enjoy today could not exist under that sort of copyright regime? Disney is the obvious example, but many other works are on some level derivative of previous works and would be banished from existence by such a law.

Works of art survive because they are reproduced. This is why still-existing older works are so much better, having been heavily selected already.

Given the already ridiculous difficulty in identifying copyright holders in some cases presently, creating an eternal paperwork burden is a sure way to ensure that works become legally unusable, preventing them from being reproduced and ensuring their demise.