Eastman Kodak Co. v. Image Technical Services, Inc., 504 U.S. 451, 39 (1992)

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Cite as: 504 U. S. 451 (1992)

Scalia, J., dissenting

tain markets, see, e. g., Brown Shoe Co. v. United States, 370 U. S. 294, 330 (1962), permitting "clandestine price cutting in products which otherwise would have no price competition at all because of fear of retaliation from the few other producers dealing in the market," Fortner I, supra, at 514, n. 9 (White, J., dissenting), assuring quality control, see, e. g., Standard Oil Co. of Cal. v. United States, 337 U. S. 293, 306 (1949), and, where "the tied and tying products are functionally related, . . . reduc[ing] costs through economies of joint production and distribution." Fortner I, supra, at 514, n. 9 (White, J., dissenting). "Accordingly, we have [only] condemned tying arrangements [under the per se rule] when the seller has some special ability—usually called 'market power'—to force a purchaser to do something that he would not do in a competitive market." Jefferson Parish, supra, at 13-14.

The Court today finds in the typical manufacturer's inherent power over its own brand of equipment—over the sale of distinctive repair parts for that equipment, for example— the sort of "monopoly power" sufficient to bring the sledgehammer of § 2 into play. And, not surprisingly in light of that insight, it readily labels single-brand power over after-market products "market power" sufficient to permit an antitrust plaintiff to invoke the per se rule against tying. In my opinion, this makes no economic sense. The holding that market power can be found on the present record causes these venerable rules of selective proscription to extend well beyond the point where the reasoning that supports them leaves off. Moreover, because the sort of power condemned by the Court today is possessed by every manufacturer of durable goods with distinctive parts, the Court's opinion threatens to release a torrent of litigation and a flood of commercial intimidation that will do much more harm than good to enforcement of the antitrust laws and to genuine competition. I shall explain, in Parts II and III, respectively, how neither logic nor experience suggests, let alone compels, ap-

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