Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/05pdf/05-130.pdf
Page Number: 11

Cite as:  547 U. S. ____ (2006) 

1 

KENNEDY, J., concurring 

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 

_________________ 

No. 05–130 
_________________ 

EBAY INC., ET AL., PETITIONERS v.

MERCEXCHANGE, L. L. C. 

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF

APPEALS FOR THE FEDERAL CIRCUIT

[May 15, 2006] 

JUSTICE  KENNEDY,  with  whom  JUSTICE  STEVENS, 

JUSTICE SOUTER, and JUSTICE BREYER join, concurring. 

The  Court  is  correct,  in  my  view,  to  hold  that  courts
should  apply  the  well-established, 
four-factor  test— 
without resort to categorical rules—in deciding whether to
grant  injunctive  relief  in  patent  cases.    THE  CHIEF 
JUSTICE  is  also  correct  that  history  may  be  instructive  in
applying this test.  Ante, at 1–2 (concurring opinion).  The 
traditional  practice  of  issuing  injunctions  against  patent
infringers,  however,  does  not  seem  to  rest  on  “the  diffi-
culty  of  protecting  a  right  to  exclude  through  monetary 
remedies  that  allow  an  infringer  to  use  an  invention 
against the patentee’s wishes.”  Ante, at 1 (ROBERTS, C. J., 
concurring).    Both  the  terms  of  the  Patent  Act  and  the 
traditional  view  of  injunctive  relief  accept  that  the  exis-
tence of a right to exclude does not dictate the remedy for 
a  violation  of  that  right.    Ante,  at  3–4  (opinion  of  the
Court).  To  the  extent  earlier  cases  establish  a  pattern  of
granting an injunction against patent infringers almost as
a  matter  of  course,  this  pattern  simply  illustrates  the 
result  of  the  four-factor  test  in  the  contexts  then  preva-
lent.  The  lesson  of  the  historical  practice,  therefore,  is 
most helpful and instructive when the circumstances of a 
case bear substantial parallels to litigation the courts have 
confronted before.