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Patents And Antitrust: Peaceful Coxeistence?, S. Chesterfield Oppenheim

Michigan Law Review

My thesis for this paper is based upon developments which appear, as of 1955, to bring into clearer focus the process by which the earned differential advantages of patent rights are being adjusted to the prohibitory dixits of antitrust law. This is part of the never-ending governmental function of balancing stability of legal rights against the desired flexibility resulting from evolutionary growth. We can only chart the directions of the current trends. Generalizations from this panorama should not be overdrawn or artificially simplified. Both the patent and antitrust spectra are arranged in degrees. The edges of certainty are blurred in …