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Opinion of the Court
ited "very great" and in this case "almost conclusive" weight. Ibid. (quoting Burrow-Giles Lithographic Co. v. Sarony, 111 U. S. 53, 57 (1884)). As early as McClurg v. Kingsland, 1 How. 202 (1843), the Court of Appeals added, this Court had made it "plain" that the same Clause permits Congress to "amplify the terms of an existing patent." 239 F. 3d, at 380. The appeals court recognized that this Court has been similarly deferential to the judgment of Congress in the realm of copyright. Ibid. (citing Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U. S. 417 (1984); Stewart v. Abend, 495 U. S. 207 (1990)).
Concerning petitioners' assertion that Congress might evade the limitation on its authority by stringing together "an unlimited number of 'limited Times,' " the Court of Appeals stated that such legislative misbehavior "clearly is not the situation before us." 239 F. 3d, at 379. Rather, the court noted, the CTEA "matches" the baseline term for "United States copyrights [with] the terms of copyrights granted by the European Union." Ibid. "[I]n an era of multinational publishers and instantaneous electronic transmission," the court said, "harmonization in this regard has obvious practical benefits" and is "a 'necessary and proper' measure to meet contemporary circumstances rather than a step on the way to making copyrights perpetual." Ibid.
Judge Sentelle dissented in part. He concluded that Congress lacks power under the Copyright Clause to expand the copyright terms of existing works. Id., at 380-384. The Court of Appeals subsequently denied rehearing and rehearing en banc. 255 F. 3d 849 (2001).
We granted certiorari to address two questions: whether the CTEA's extension of existing copyrights exceeds Congress' power under the Copyright Clause; and whether the CTEA's extension of existing and future copyrights violates the First Amendment. 534 U. S. 1126 and 1160 (2002). We now answer those two questions in the negative and affirm.
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