Law Commons^™

Dr. Miles Is Dead. Now What?: Structuring A Rule Of Reason For Evaluating Minimum Resale Price Maintenance, Thomas A. Lambert

Thomas A. Lambert

In Leegin Creative Leather Prods., Inc. v. PSKS, Inc., decided in 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court overruled its 1911 precedent declaring vertical minimum resale price maintenance (RPM) to be per se illegal. The Leegin Court held that the practice should instead be examined on a case-by-case basis under antitrust's rule of reason. The Court further exhorted the lower courts to craft a "structured" rule of reason for evaluating RPM. This article critiques six approaches that have been proposed for evaluating minimum RPM and offers an alternative approach. The six approaches critiqued are (1) the Brandeisian, unstructured rule of reason; (2) …

Rpm As An Exclusionary Practice, Ittai Paldor

Ittai Paldor

The existing explanations for resale price maintenance (RPM) are divided along a clear line, separating the pro- and anti- competitive explanations. The anti-competitive explanations suggest that RPM is introduced in furtherance of a cartel either at the retail level or at the manufacturing level. The pro-competitive explanations, by contrast, are all based on the assumption that RPM is designed to benefit a single manufacturer. A key distinction in classifying RPM systems according to the present state of the literature is thus the distinction between single-manufacturer-driven RPM and any other RPM system. This distinction is of major practical importance subsequent to …

Legal Turbulence After : New Possibilities For Patent Licensing At Research Institutions, Jonathan Hillel

Northwestern Journal of Technology and Intellectual Property

No abstract provided.

On The Ramifications Of Leegin Creative Leather Products, Inc. Psks, Inc.: Art Tie-Ins Next Essay , Alan Devlin

Cleveland State Law Review

This Essay considers whether the Roberts Court would now overrule the last bastion of the Harvard School-the rule against product tying-if given the opportunity. The economic arguments against per se treatment of tie-ins apply a fortiori to those against resale price maintenance. In addition, applying the line of thought followed by the majority in Leegin leads inexorably to the conclusion that the per se rule proscribing tying arrangements should be similarly overruled. Part II explains the business practice of resale price maintenance and the law's formerly mistaken understanding of its consequences. The Leegin case will then be introduced and compendiously …

Vertical Price Restraints After Leegin, Edward D. Cavanagh

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

In Leegin Creative Leather Products, Inc. v. PSKS, Inc., the Supreme Court by a vote of 5-4 overruled the century old per se ban on resale price maintenance ("r/p/r") enunciated in the Dr. Miles case. The Court did not rule that r/p/m is lawful per se but rather held that vertical price restraints should be adjudged under the broader rule of reason analysis. The decision was not unexpected; and, indeed, it was welcomed in many quarters. From one perspective, Leegin is a long overdue ruling that simply brings treatment of r/p/m into line with the treatment of vertical …