Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/17pdf/16-712_87ad.pdf
Page Number: 22.0

Cite as:  584 U. S. ____ (2018) 

1 

GORSUCH, J., dissenting 

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 

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No. 16–712 
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OIL STATES ENERGY SERVICES, LLC, PETITIONER 
v. GREENE’S ENERGY GROUP, LLC, ET AL. 

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF 
APPEALS FOR THE FEDERAL CIRCUIT 

[April 24, 2018] 

  JUSTICE  GORSUCH,  with  whom  THE  CHIEF  JUSTICE 
joins, dissenting. 
  After  much  hard  work  and  no  little  investment  you 
devise something you think truly novel.  Then you endure 
the further cost and effort of applying for a patent, devot-
ing maybe $30,000 and two years to that process alone.  At 
the end of it all, the Patent Office agrees your invention is 
novel  and  issues  a  patent.    The  patent  affords  you  exclu-
sive rights to the fruits of your labor for two decades.  But 
what  happens  if  someone  later  emerges  from  the  wood-
work,  arguing  that  it  was  all  a  mistake  and  your  patent 
should  be  canceled?    Can  a  political  appointee  and  his 
administrative  agents,  instead  of  an  independent  judge, 
resolve the dispute?  The Court says yes.  Respectfully, I 
disagree. 
  We  sometimes  take  it  for  granted  today  that  independ-
ent  judges  will  hear  our  cases  and  controversies.    But  it 
wasn’t  always  so.    Before  the  Revolution,  colonial  judges 
depended  on  the  crown  for  their  tenure  and  salary  and 
often enough their decisions followed their interests.  The 
problem  was so serious  that  the  founders  cited  it  in their 
Declaration  of  Independence  (see  ¶11).    Once  free,  the 
framers  went  to  great  lengths  to  guarantee  a  degree  of 
judicial  independence  for  future  generations  that  they 
themselves had not experienced.  Under the Constitution,