Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/19pdf/18-1501_8n5a.pdf
Page Number: 11.0

8 

LIU v. SEC 

Opinion of the Court 

In Great-West, the Court noted that an “accounting for prof-
its” was historically a “form of equitable restitution.”  534 
U. S., at 214, n. 2.  And in  Kansas v. Nebraska, 574 U. S. 
445  (2015),  a  “ ‘basically  equitable’ ”  original  jurisdiction
proceeding, the Court ordered disgorgement of Nebraska’s
gains from exceeding its allocation under an interstate wa-
ter compact.  Id., at 453, 475. 

Most  recently,  in  SCA  Hygiene  Products  Aktiebolag  v. 
First Quality Baby Products, LLC, 580 U. S. ___ (2017), the
Court canvassed pre-1938 patent cases invoking equity ju-
risdiction.  It noted that many cases sought an “accounting,” 
which  it  described  as  an  equitable  remedy  requiring  dis-
gorgement of ill-gotten profits.  Id., at ___ (slip op., at 11). 
This Court’s “transsubstantive guidance on broad and fun-
damental”  equitable  principles,  Romag  Fasteners,  Inc.  v. 
Fossil Group, Inc., 590 U. S. ___, ___ (2020) (slip op., at 5), 
thus reflects the teachings of equity treatises that identify 
a defendant’s net profits as a remedy for wrongdoing.

Contrary to petitioners’ argument, equity courts did not 
limit this remedy to cases involving a breach of trust or of
fiduciary duty.  Brief for Petitioners 28–29.  As petitioners
acknowledge,  courts  authorized  profits-based  relief  in  pa-
tent-infringement actions where no such trust or special re-
lationship  existed.  Id.,  at  29;  see  also  Root,  105  U. S.,  at 
214 (“[I]t is nowhere said that the patentee’s right to an ac-
count is based upon the idea that there is a fiduciary rela-
tion created between him and the wrong-doer by the fact of 
infringement”).

Petitioners attempt to distinguish these patent cases by
suggesting  that  an  “accounting”  was  appropriate  only  be-
cause Congress explicitly conferred that remedy by statute 
in 1870.  Brief for Petitioners 29 (citing the Act of July 8, 
1870, §55, 16 Stat. 206).  But patent law had not previously 
deviated  from  the  general  principles  outlined  above:  This 

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profits’ ”); Tull, 481 U. S., at 424).