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Extending Copyright And The Constitution: "Have I Stayed Too Long", Michael H. Davis

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

On October 27, 1998, President Clinton signed into law the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998, Pub. L. No. 105-298, 112 Stat. 2827 (hereinafter the “Bono Law”). The Bono Law extended the term of copyright protection by an additional twenty years, both prospectively and retrospectively. The former is probably constitutionally proper; the latter is almost certainly forbidden by the Constitution's copyright clause. But most criticism5 has not forcefully distinguished between retrospective as opposed to prospective extension and so far has failed to convince either Congress or the courts of any constitutional infirmity. This is because most critics agree-or …