when Lessig argued Eldred v Ashcroft before the Supreme Court, the argument went something like: the Constitution states that copyrights are to be granted for a

when Lessig argued Eldred v Ashcroft before the Supreme Court, the argument went something like: the Constitution states that copyrights are to be granted for a "limited time"; if Congress can pass an unlimited number of finite extensions to the copyright period, this flouts the original meaning and is unconstitutional. alas, the majority bought into the government's argument that this most recent extension was (again) to bring US law in "harmonization" with EU law, and was so permitted. BUT, iirc, there was some grumbling along the lines of "if they try this again, Lessig's argument will carry more weight". so it will be interesting to see what happens next time around.