# The Copyright and Patent Clause -- are current laws unconstitutional?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-copyright-and-patent-clause-are-current-laws-unconstitutional/533224>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [March 21, 2010, 10:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-copyright-and-patent-clause-are-current-laws-unconstitutional/533224 "2010-03-21T10:24:04Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\
**Post date:** [March 22, 2010, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-copyright-and-patent-clause-are-current-laws-unconstitutional/533224/21 "2010-03-22T05:53:58Z")

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> [@Walloon](#):
>
> U.S. patent, true; U.S. copyright, not true. Under U.S. copyright law, a creative work made by an employee for an employer is not assigned to the employer by the employee; it has always been the employer’s property.

Thanks for the correction/clarification (and also to **acsenray** ). What I was fairly sure of for patents, I generalized incorrectly to copyrights as well. :o

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**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\
**Post date:** [March 22, 2010, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-copyright-and-patent-clause-are-current-laws-unconstitutional/533224/22 "2010-03-22T14:36:53Z")

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> [@Musicat](#):
>
> I don’t believe anyone has yet mentioned Lawrence Lessig or Sonny Bono in this thread. It was the 20 extra years that Bono pushed thru congress that made the latest brew-haha, _[Elred v. Ashcroft.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eldred_v._Ashcroft)_ While SCOTUS has allowed all copyright extensions so far and has proposed no limit, it seems unreasonable that an infinite number of these would meet the “limited times” provision of the Constitution.

Whenever somebody mentions Sonny Bono I am obliged to mention that the Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998 added those extra 20 years to match the change that the European Union had made five years earlier. There was not a chance in the world that the US and the EU would have different copyright term lengths. Once the EU acted, it was only a matter of time until the US did.

People can blame Bono or Walt Disney or post utter nonsense like this line at Wikipedia “Prior to the 1976 copyright act, many copyrighted literary works, movies and fictional characters were soon to pass into the public domain due to their 56 year maximum copyright terms. Some of these copyrighted items remained quite profitable for their copyright owners, including several characters owned by the Walt Disney Company.[citation needed]”(no Disney characters would move into the public domain) but the westernized world is going to have a common copyright length. Period.

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