ABSTRACT
Rereading Warren and Brandeis, as one must on this hundredth anniversary of their "monumental article", comes as something of a shock. The prestige and enormous influence of the piece creates expectations of sweeping vistas and irresistible arguments. But, setting aside the rhetorically powerful (and often quoted) passages of complaint against the irresponsibility of the press, the article offers instead a technical and rather dry exposition of the legal rights of unpublished authors and artists. The argument from authority was important to Warren and Brandeis because they were concerned to cast the right to privacy as a mere extension of existing common law principles and so avoid the charge of "judicial legislation". Warren and Brandeis evidently believed that once common law copyright was forced to recognize its roots in personality, it would necessarily shift its foundation from property to privacy.
