656
Stevens, J., dissenting
difficult, under California law. Consequently, relief under [state statutes] may be not be a true alternative avenue of recovery." House Hearing 33.7
Congress heard other general testimony that state remedies would likely be insufficient to compensate inventors whose patents had been infringed. The Acting Commissioner of Patents stated: "If States and their instrumentalities were immune from suit in federal court for patent infringement, patent holders would be forced to pursue uncertain, perhaps even non-existent, remedies under State law." Id., at 15. The legislative record references several cases of patent infringement involving States. See Paperless Accounting, Inc. v. Mass Transit Administration, Civil No. HAR 84-2922 (D. Md. 1985) (cited in House Hearing 56); Hercules, Inc. v. Minnesota State Highway Dept., 337 F. Supp. 795 (Minn. 1972) (House Hearing 51); Lemelson v. Ampex Corp., 372 F. Supp. 708 (ND Ill. 1974) (same).
In addition, Congress found that state infringement of patents was likely to increase. H. R. Rep. No. 101-960, pt. 1, at 38. The Court's opinion today dismisses this rationale: "At most, Congress heard testimony that patent infringement by States might increase in the future and acted to head off this speculative harm." Ante, at 641 (citations omitted). In fact, States and their instrumentalities, especially state universities, have been involved in many patent cases since 1992. See Regents of Univ. of Minn. v. Glaxo Wellcome, Inc., 44 F. Supp. 2d 998 (Minn. 1999) (declaratory
7 Merges continued: "Another problem with this approach is that it assumes that such state law remedies will be available in every state in which the patentee's product is sold. This may or may not be true. In any event, requiring a potential plaintiff (patentee) to ascertain the validity of her claims under the differing substantive and procedural laws of the fifty states may well prove a very substantial disincentive to the commencement of such suits. Moreover, it would vitiate a major goal of the federal intellectual property system: national uniformity. In short, these remedies are simply no substitute for patent infringement actions." Id., at 34.
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