The U.S. Supreme Court case Leeds & Catlin Company v. Victor Talking Machine Company (No. 2) in 1908 revolved around patent rights for sound recording technology, specifically revolving disc records and the machines that played them. The Victor Talking Machine Company claimed that Leeds & Catlin had infringed upon their patents by producing similar products without permission or licensing agreements, thereby violating the Patent Act of 1790 which protected inventors' exclusive rights to their inventions for a certain period of time. The court ruled in favor of the Victor Talking Machine company, stating that Leeds & Catlin had indeed violated these patent laws and were therefore liable for damages caused by this infringement.

The dissenting opinion in the Leeds & Catlin Company v. Victor Talking Machine Company case argued that the majority's decision to uphold a lower court's injunction against Leeds & Catlin was incorrect. The dissenters believed that Victor Talking Machine Company did not have exclusive rights to manufacture and sell sound records of certain types, as they had claimed. They contended that while Victor may have held patents for specific improvements on these types of records, this did not give them monopoly control over all such products. Furthermore, they disagreed with the majority’s interpretation of patent law and its application in this case. In their view, if a company could claim broad monopolistic rights based on minor patented improvements it would stifle competition and innovation within industries.