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Constitutional Law

Constitution

Journal

2003

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

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Eldred's Aftermath: Tradition, The Copyright Clause, And The Constitutionalization Of Fair Use, Stephen M. Mcjohn Oct 2003

Eldred's Aftermath: Tradition, The Copyright Clause, And The Constitutionalization Of Fair Use, Stephen M. Mcjohn

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Eldred v. Ashcroft offered the Supreme Court broad issues about the scope of Congress's constitutional power to legislate in the area of intellectual property. In 1998, Congress added twenty years to the term of all copyrights, both existing and future copyrights. But for this term extension, works created during the 1920s and 1930s would be entering the public domain. Now such works will remain under copyright until 2018 and beyond. Eldred v. Ashcroft rejected two challenges to the constitutionality of the copyright extension. The first challenge contended that Congress had exceeded its power to grant copyrights for "limited Times" in …


Constitutional Purpose And Inter-Clause Conflict: The Constraints Imposed On Congress By The Copyright Clause, Andrew M. Hetherington Apr 2003

Constitutional Purpose And Inter-Clause Conflict: The Constraints Imposed On Congress By The Copyright Clause, Andrew M. Hetherington

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

The argument that the preamble of the Copyright Clause provides a strict constraint on congressional intellectual property legislation has met with broad support among legal academics, but it is viewed with some skepticism by the judiciary. The Supreme Court did acknowledge in Eldred that intellectual property legislation must, in at least some sense, promote the progress of science, but stressed that it is for Congress, not the courts, to decide what does and does not promote progress. The Court specifically rejected a "stringent" form of rational basis review for Copyright Clause enactments proposed in Justice Breyer's dissent, noting that the …