American Bible Society & Others v. Price was a United States Supreme Court case that dealt with the issue of copyright infringement. The case involved the American Bible Society, which had published a version of the Bible in 1876, and the defendant, Price, who had published a similar version of the Bible without the Society's permission. The Society argued that Price had infringed upon their copyright and sought damages. The Supreme Court ultimately ruled in favor of the Society, finding that Price had indeed infringed upon the Society's copyright. The Court held that the Society had a valid copyright in their version of the Bible, and that Price had violated that copyright by publishing a similar version without the Society's permission. The Court also held that the Society was entitled to damages for the infringement. In its decision, the Court noted that copyright protection was necessary to protect the rights of authors and publishers, and that copyright infringement should not be tolerated. The Court also noted that the Society had invested considerable time and money in producing their version of the Bible, and that Price had unfairly taken advantage of their work.

In the case of American Bible Society & Others v. Price, the Supreme Court was tasked with determining whether a tax imposed by Georgia on all sales of Bibles and religious books violated the First Amendment's protection against laws respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting free exercise thereof. The majority opinion held that such a tax did not violate either clause because it applied to all books equally regardless of their content, thus making it neutral in its application. However, Justice Field dissented from this decision arguing that while the law may have been facially neutral, its purpose and effect were to target religious works for taxation which would be unconstitutional under both clauses as it constituted an infringement upon freedom of speech and press as well as freedom to practice one’s own faith without government interference. He further argued that even if there had been no discriminatory intent behind imposing such taxes on religious works specifically, they still amounted to “a practical prohibition” due to their prohibitive cost which could effectively prevent people from exercising their right to freely practice religion or read certain texts associated with particular faiths.