5. Chappell & Co and others V Nestlé and others June 19, 1959

In the 1950s, giving away discounted goods in exchange for chocolate or candy wrappers was a popular marketing scheme. The law had to decide how this should work if royalties were payable on the discounted item. Should the copyright owners get a percentage of just the discounted price paid by the customers, or should the royalty be based on the price of the item plus the value of the wrappers they handed in? In this case, Nestle, in a promotion for its chocolate bars, gave away a pop single, “Rockin’ Shoes”, in exchange for three wrappers and 1s 6d (about 8p) for postage. According to the law, Chappell, the publisher of the song, was entitled to 6.25 per cent of the “selling price” of each record. It sued Nestle. Chappell won the case as the House of Lords decided that the “selling price” on which their royalty should be based wasn’t just the 1s 6d but also included the value represented by the three wrapping papers. It didn’t matter that the actual papers themselves were of no intrinsic value (Nestle threw them away when they got them back from customers) as they were the value asked for by Nestle.

6. R V Penguin Books Ltd October 21, November 3, 1960

This is a classic case on law, art and freedom of expression. On October 20, 1960, a jury of nine men and three women were handed unexpurgated copies of D H Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover and instructed to read it. Its publishers, Penguin Books Ltd, were being prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act, which allowed for literary and artistic merit to be considered in judging whether a work was obscene. The prosecutor, Mervyn Griffith-Jones, argued that the book had no substantial literary merit and merely advocated “coarseness and vulgarity”. He set the jury the following test: “Is it a book you would even wish your wife or servants to read?” But Penguin’s lawyer, Gerald Gardiner, QC, defended the use of four-letter words by arguing that if such language was depraved and corrupt then “95 per cent of the Army, Navy, and Air Force are past redemption”. The defence also called the novelist EM Forster, who said he knew Lawrence well and regarded him as the greatest writer of his generation; Cecil Day-Lewis also testified on his behalf. Penguin was acquitted and Lady Chatterley’s Lover went on to sell three million copies in a year.

7. Fisher V Bell November 11, 1960

This was a classic decision determining a highly consequential point of retail law. The Restriction of Offensive Weapons Act 1959 made it an offence to offer for sale certain offensive weapons, including “flick-knives”. James Bell, a Bristol shop keeper, displayed a weapon of this type, an “ejector knife” selling for 4s, in his shop window. The Divisional Court held that he could not be convicted because, giving the words in the Act their tight, literal legal meaning, Bell had not “offered” the knives for sale. Under the law of contract, placing something in a shop window is not, technically, an “offer for sale”; it is merely an “invitation to treat”. It is the customer who legally makes an “offer” to the shop when he proffers money for an item on sale. This decision has significance in other scenarios. What if a £2,000 multimedia system was mispriced in the shop window at £200? The decision in Fisher v Bell means that you can’t seal a contract by walking into the store and saying, “I accept”. The shop has the final say about whether it wants to make a contract with you and on the terms you offer.