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Relaxing The Noose Around Tying Arrangements: Reifert V. South Central Wisconsin Mls Corp. Exposes Problems With The Per Se Analysis, Paul C. Mallon Jr.

Seventh Circuit Review

The U.S. Supreme Court has employed the per se standard for illegality of tying arrangements under antitrust laws for some sixty years. The tying arrangement, once reviled by the House of Representatives as "one of the greatest agencies and instrumentalities of monopoly ever devised by man," is now understood by many to have potentially redeeming, as well as condemning, qualities. As a result, scholars and judges alike have decried the per se standard as ineffective and called for its abandonment. However, the Supreme Court continues to endorse the per se standard when assessing tying arrangements. The Seventh Circuit, like other …