Statutory Domain and the Commercial Law of Intellectual Property

77 Pages Posted: 28 Apr 2015 Last revised: 7 Aug 2017

See all articles by John F. Duffy

John F. Duffy

University of Virginia School of Law

Richard M. Hynes

University of Virginia School of Law

Date Written: March 2016

Abstract

For more than a century, the commercial law of intellectual property has generated intense controversy with ever-growing stakes. The central fulcrum in the area -- the “first-sale” or “exhaustion” doctrine -- has produced four recent Supreme Court cases, a host of lower court decisions, and a mountain of scholarly criticism. Scholars who otherwise agree on little unite in excoriating the doctrine as a “per se,” “ham-handed,” “sterile” rule that is “frustratingly under-theorized” and grounded in “a set of arid technicalities of no particular value.” Champions of intellectual property dislike the doctrine because they want infringement suits to enforce contractual restrictions on goods embodying intellectual property. Skeptics of intellectual property want a stronger doctrine that would sweep away all contractual restrictions and encumbrances on such goods. We argue that both camps wrongly assume that the doctrine was created through common-law reasoning in pursuit of substantive policies such as fostering an unencumbered flow of goods in commerce. This Article demonstrates that, in both its historical origins and its current application, the law in this area is based on statutory interpretation and is directed toward the more nuanced goal of limiting the domain of intellectual property statutes to avoid displacing other areas of law. This thesis explains why the foundational cases reject intellectual property infringement claims but are agnostic as to whether the unsuccessful plaintiffs could achieve their goals under contract or property law theories. The century-long development of law in this area also provides useful insights for statutory interpretation theory by illustrating precisely how courts limit a statute’s domain so that one area of law appropriately yields to another.

Keywords: Intellectual Property, Patent Law, Copyright Law, Commercial Law, First-Sale Doctrine, Exhaustion Doctrine, Statutory Interpretation

JEL Classification: K11, K21, K23, O34

Suggested Citation

Duffy, John Fitzgerald and Hynes, Richard M., Statutory Domain and the Commercial Law of Intellectual Property (March 2016). 102 Virginia Law Review, No. 1, March 2016, Virginia Public Law and Legal Theory Research Paper No. 2015-25, Virginia Law and Economics Research Paper No. 2015-13, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2599074

John Fitzgerald Duffy (Contact Author)

University of Virginia School of Law ( email )

580 Massie Road
Charlottesville, VA 22903
United States
434-243-8544 (Phone)

HOME PAGE: http://www.law.virginia.edu/lawweb/faculty.nsf/FHPbI/2141954

Richard M. Hynes

University of Virginia School of Law ( email )

580 Massie Road
Charlottesville, VA 22903
United States
434-924-3743 (Phone)

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