A battle over what might be the largest patent-damage award in U.S. history has arrived at the U.S. Supreme Court in a case centering on judicial recusal because of stock ownership.

The petition for review in Centripetal Networks v. Cisco Systems comes at a time of increased attention to stock ownership by judges and members of Congress. There is legislation in the U.S. House that would toughen the standards for judicial recusal under the federal recusal statute, 28 U.S.C. §455(a).