In common-law legal systems, laches is a lack of diligence and activity in making a legal claim, or moving forward with legal enforcement of a right, particularly in regard to equity. This means that it is an unreasonable delay that can be viewed as prejudicing the opposing party. When asserted in litigation, it is an equity defense, that is, a defense to a claim for an equitable remedy.
Raging Bull is a 1980 American biographical sports drama film directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, Cathy Moriarty, Nicholas Colasanto, Theresa Saldana and Frank Vincent. The film is an adaption of former middleweight boxing champion Jake LaMotta's 1970 memoir Raging Bull: My Story. It follows the career of LaMotta, played by De Niro, his rise and fall in the boxing scene, and his turbulent personal life beset by rage and jealousy.
An injunction is an equitable remedy in the form of a special court order that compels a party to do or refrain from specific acts. "When a court employs the extraordinary remedy of injunction, it directs the conduct of a party, and does so with the backing of its full coercive powers." A party that fails to comply with an injunction faces criminal or civil penalties, including possible monetary sanctions and even imprisonment. They can also be charged with contempt of court.
Maxims of equity are legal maxims that serve as a set of general principles or rules which are said to govern the way in which equity operates. They tend to illustrate the qualities of equity, in contrast to the common law, as a more flexible, responsive approach to the needs of the individual, inclined to take into account the parties' conduct and worthiness. They were developed by the English Court of Chancery and other courts that administer equity jurisdiction, including the law of trusts. Although the most fundamental and time honored of the maxims, listed on this page, are often referred to on their own as the 'maxims of equity' or 'the equitable maxims',The first equitable maxim is 'equity delights in equality' or equity is equality Like other kinds of legal maxims or principles, they were originally, and sometimes still are, expressed in Latin.
Copyright misuse is an equitable defence to copyright infringement in the United States based upon the doctrine of unclean hands. The misuse doctrine provides that the copyright holder engaged in abusive or improper conduct in exploiting or enforcing the copyright will be precluded from enforcing his rights against the infringer. Copyright misuse is often comparable to and draws from the older and more established doctrine of patent misuse, which bars a patentee from obtaining relief for infringement when he extends his patent rights beyond the limited monopoly conferred by the law.
A declaratory judgment, also called a declaration, is the legal determination of a court that resolves legal uncertainty for the litigants. It is a form of legally binding preventive by which a party involved in an actual or possible legal matter can ask a court to conclusively rule on and affirm the rights, duties, or obligations of one or more parties in a civil dispute. The declaratory judgment is generally considered a statutory remedy and not an equitable remedy in the United States, and is thus not subject to equitable requirements, though there are analogies that can be found in the remedies granted by courts of equity. A declaratory judgment does not by itself order any action by a party, or imply damages or an injunction, although it may be accompanied by one or more other remedies.
Third party standing is a term of the law of civil procedure that describes when one party may file a lawsuit or assert a defense in which the rights of third parties are asserted. In the United States, this is generally prohibited, as a party can only assert his or her own rights and cannot raise the claims of right of a third party who is not before the court. However, there are several exceptions to this doctrine.
The exhaustion doctrine, also referred to as the first sale doctrine, is a U.S. common law patent doctrine that limits the extent to which patent holders can control an individual article of a patented product after a so-called authorized sale. Under the doctrine, once an authorized sale of a patented article occurs, the patent holder's exclusive rights to control the use and sale of that article are said to be "exhausted," and the purchaser is free to use or resell that article without further restraint from patent law. However, under the repair and reconstruction doctrine, the patent owner retains the right to exclude purchasers of the articles from making the patented invention anew, unless it is specifically authorized by the patentee to do so.
Pro-Football, Inc. v. Harjo, 415 F.3d 44, is a case in which the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia considered the decision of the United States Patent and Trademark Office's Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) to cancel the registration of the Washington Redskins football team, based on the claim that the name was disparaging to Native Americans. The Court of Appeals did not actually reach the merits of the TTAB's decision; it sent the case back to the trial court for consideration of a procedural issue.
Equitable remedies are judicial remedies developed by courts of equity from about the time of Henry VIII to provide more flexible responses to changing social conditions than was possible in precedent-based common law.
Stewart v. Abend, 495 U.S. 207 (1990), was a United States Supreme Court decision holding that a successor copyright owner has the exclusive right to permit the creation and exploitation of derivative works, regardless of potentially conflicting agreements by prior copyright holders.
The Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act (OCILLA) is United States federal law that creates a conditional 'safe harbor' for online service providers (OSP), a group which includes Internet service providers (ISP) and other Internet intermediaries, by shielding them for their own acts of direct copyright infringement as well as shielding them from potential secondary liability for the infringing acts of others. OCILLA was passed as a part of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) and is sometimes referred to as the "Safe Harbor" provision or as "DMCA 512" because it added Section 512 to Title 17 of the United States Code. By exempting Internet intermediaries from copyright infringement liability provided they follow certain rules, OCILLA attempts to strike a balance between the competing interests of copyright owners and digital users.
The copyright law of the United States grants monopoly protection for "original works of authorship". With the stated purpose to promote art and culture, copyright law assigns a set of exclusive rights to authors: to make and sell copies of their works, to create derivative works, and to perform or display their works publicly. These exclusive rights are subject to a time and generally expire 70 years after the author's death or 95 years after publication. In the United States, works published before January 1, 1928, are in the public domain.
In United States law, the federal government as well as state and tribal governments generally enjoy sovereign immunity, also known as governmental immunity, from lawsuits. Local governments in most jurisdictions enjoy immunity from some forms of suit, particularly in tort. The Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act provides foreign governments, including state-owned companies, with a related form of immunity—state immunity—that shields them from lawsuits except in relation to certain actions relating to commercial activity in the United States. The principle of sovereign immunity in US law was inherited from the English common law legal maxim rex non potest peccare, meaning "the king can do no wrong." In some situations, sovereign immunity may be waived by law.
The United States was the first jurisdiction to acknowledge the common law doctrine of aboriginal title. Native American tribes and nations establish aboriginal title by actual, continuous, and exclusive use and occupancy for a "long time." Individuals may also establish aboriginal title, if their ancestors held title as individuals. Unlike other jurisdictions, the content of aboriginal title is not limited to historical or traditional land uses. Aboriginal title may not be alienated, except to the federal government or with the approval of Congress. Aboriginal title is distinct from the lands Native Americans own in fee simple and occupy under federal trust.
County of Oneida v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York State, 470 U.S. 226 (1985), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case concerning aboriginal title in the United States. The case, sometimes referred to as Oneida II, was "the first Indian land claim case won on the basis of the Nonintercourse Act."
Cayuga Indian Nation of New York v. Pataki, 413 F.3d 266, is an important precedent in the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit for the litigation of aboriginal title in the United States. Applying the U.S. Supreme Court's recent ruling in City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York (2005), a divided panel held that the equitable doctrine of laches bars all tribal land claims sounding in ejectment or trespass, for both tribal plaintiffs and the federal government as plaintiff-intervenor.
Motion Picture Patents Co. v. Universal Film Mfg. Co., 243 U.S. 502 (1917), is United States Supreme Court decision that is notable as an early example of the patent misuse doctrine. It held that, because a patent grant is limited to the invention described in the claims of the patent, the patent law does not empower the patent owner, by notices attached to the patented article, to extend the scope of the patent monopoly by restricting the use of the patented article to materials necessary for their operation but forming no part of the patented invention, or to place downstream restrictions on the articles making them subject to conditions as to use. The decision overruled The Button-Fastener Case, and Henry v. A.B. Dick Co., which had held such restrictive notices effective and enforceable.
Penguin Books Ltd. v. India Book Distributors and Others, was a 1984 Delhi High Court court case. Penguin Books Ltd. of England brought a suit for perpetual injunction against the respondents, India Book Distributors of New Delhi, to restrain them from infringing Penguin's territorial license in 23 books, the subject matter of the suit.
VMG Salsoul v Ciccone 824 F.3d 871 is a court case that has played an important role in redefining the legal status of sampling in music under American copyright law. The case involved a claim of copyright infringement brought forth against the pop star Madonna, for sampling the horns from an early 1980s song "Ooh I Love It " by the Salsoul Orchestra in her international hit song "Vogue". Such sampling was done without a license, or compensation to VMG Salsoul, LLC, which was the copyright holder of "Love Break" and therefore brought suit claiming infringement and damages. The Ninth Circuit was to rule upon a contentious issue in the music industry at large, i.e. whether the de minimis defense is applicable against a claim of copyright infringement in the case of sound recording, with special regard to the practice of sampling.
