Thursday, September 19, 2002

Steven Levy profiles law prof Larry Lessig for Wired. Lessig is embarrassed about having been a right-winger. "I grew up a right-wing lunatic Republican," says Lessig. Lessig's big case now is the Eldred case against copyright extension.


The Berkman team took the case to the Court of Appeals later that year. This was the first and only time Lessig appeared in court on behalf of a client. "It was one of the better arguments I've ever seen," says Geoffrey Stewart. "He knew all the cases, and there was no point too grand or too trivial to escape his grasp. At a certain point, the level of questioning changed from a classic appellate argument to a dialog of genuine give-and-take." Lessig himself was pleased: "I was nervous before it started, but once it got going it was great fun," he says. ... The verdict was 2 to 1 supporting the government. Strike two. Even so, Lessig got his dissent, from the most conservative judge.


What the article omits is that the dissent was persuaded by an argument in an Eagle Forum amicus brief that Lessig disavowed.

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