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Owning Ideas
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Owning Ideas

The Intellectual Origins of American Intellectual Property, 1790–1909 (Cambridge Historical Studies in American Law and Society)

Oren Bracha
Cambridge UP, 2016

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Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Analytical
  • Concrete Examples
  • For Experts

Recommendation

Law professor Oren Bracha offers a thorough, scholarly treatise on the development of US copyright, intellectual property and patent laws. He covers the major social, economic and political trends and legal concepts behind pivotal court cases. He focuses on ideas at the core of negotiating the ownership of intangible works of the mind in the 1800s. The cases he presents shaped policy and legislation as they established the framework for intellectual property protection. He shows how these cases also relate to broader social trends. Bracha’s nuanced, though academic, overview provides excellent background and analysis for laypeople.

Take-Aways

  • Intellectual property (IP) protection changed from a “discretionary privilege” to a “universal right” during the 1800s.
  • Copyright emerged from English publishers’ patents that gave the right to print certain texts.
  • The concept of author ownership was essential to developing rights to “intellectual works.” The concept of the inventor became parallel to the concept of the author.

About the Author

Oren Bracha, SJD, is professor of law at the University of Texas and a leading scholar in the fields of intellectual property and legal history. 

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