BOTES OF DEOISIONS.
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Patents. LEHNBENTER 11. HOLTHAUS, 21 O. G. 1783. Appeal from the circuit court of the United States for the eastern district of Missouri. The case was deter· mined in the supreme court of the United States on March 6,1882, Mr. Jus' tice Woods delivering the opinion, reversing the decree of the circuit court which dismissed the bill, and remanding the cause for further proceedings in conformity with the opinion of the supreme court. In an action for infringement of a design patent, where compal'ison of which it is the drawing appended to the patent with the cut of the admitted represents articles manufactured and sold by defendants, makes it clear that the latter is a servile copy of the forlner, excepting a Blight inclina,tion backward, hardly perceptible, of the glass constituting the front of the elevated portions of the show-case, the subject of the design, it is an infringement of the patented design. The patent is prima facie evidence of both novelty and utility, and the fact that it has been infringed by the defendanl:8 is sufficient to establish its utility. at least, as to them. Citing Whitney v. Mowry, 4 Fish. 207 Patent-Reissues-Enlarging Scope of Original. MATTHEWS '0. BOSTON MACHINE CO. Appeal from the circuit court of the United States for the district of Massachusetts. This case was determined on appeal in the supreme court of the United States on March 27,1882. Mr. Justice Bradley delivered the opinion of the court affirming thedeci'ee of the circuit court. Where complainants, in their reissue, split up and divided the elements of their invention, and claimed them separably and not in combination, it is an enlargement of the scope of their patent; and where no one could infringe the original patent unless he uses all the elements of the combination,and 'anyone will infringe the reisstie who uses any of the elements which, in the reissue, are separably claimed, such reissue is void. Where there is' a wide departure from the original invention, and not only for a broader claim made many years after the original was granted, but for a different invention, the reissue cannot be sustained. George Harding and George L. Roberts, for appellants. Causten Browne, for appellees. Patents-Reissues-Laches. BANTZ '0. FUANTZ. Appeal from the circuit court of the United States for the district of Kentucky. This case was determined in the supreme court of the United States on March 20, 1882, Mr. Justice Woods delivering the opin. ion of the court and affirming the judgment of the circuit conrt. Where, under ihe original patent, suit could be maintained only against those who employed the combination embracing all the distinct contrivances described in the reissued patent, a reissue which claims each device separably is too broad, and consequently void. If any correction was desired it sh,'uld have been applied for immediately-the right is abandoned and lost by un· reasonable delay. Miller v. Bridgeport Brass Co. 3 Morr. Trans. 419, followed.
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I'lIIDEB.\:L BEPOBTEa,
Patents-Terms of Art-Extrinsic Evidence. HEALD 'D. Rl:CE. Error to the court of the United States for the district of California. This w&s an action at law brought to recover damages for .an alleged infringement of reissued letters patent granted for improvements in steam-boilers. The invention consisted, among other things, of a combination of a straw-feeding attachment with the furnace door of a returnflue steam-boiler for the use of straw alone as fuel in generating steam ample for practically operating steam-engines. The case was tried bya jury and resulted in a verdict and judgment for plaintiff, to reverse which the writ of error is prosecuted. The supreme court of the United States rendered, its decision on March 6, 1882, reversing the decision of the circuit court. Mr. Justice Matthews delivered the opinion of the court. Where the question of identity of the invention in the original and reissued patents is to be determined by their face 'from mere comparison, and if it appears from the face of the instruments that extrinsic evidence is not needed to explain terms of art or to apply the descriptions: to the subject-matter, so that the court is able from mere comparison to say what are the inventions described in each, and to affirm from such comparison that they are not the same, then the question of identity is one of pUl'e construction and not of evidence, and consequently is matter of law for the court, without any auxiliary matter of fact to be passed on by the jury, where the action is at law. Where it appears from the mere reading of the two specifications that the invention described in the first was for a return-flue boiler, while that described in the second, abandoning the claim for the boiler itself, is for a particular mode of using it, with straw as fuel, by means of an attachment to the furnace door for that purpose, they are essentially diverse, and the patent lawfully issued for one cannot be sllrrendered as the basis for a reissue for the other. A new and analogous use of an old device operating in the very manner intended by its inventor, and its use in the new application. is not the subject of a patent. George Harding and John H. Boalt, for plaintiff in error. M. A. Wheaton, for defendant in error. :Patents-Change of Method. WILSON PACKING CO. 'D. CHICAGO PACKING & PROVo Co., .AND WILSON PACKING CO. O. HUNTER, (two cases.) Appeals-the former from the United States circuit court of the northern, and the latter (two cases) for the southern district of lllinois. By stipulation of the parties these cases were argued together as one case. They were decided in the supreme court of the United States on May 8, 1882. Mr. Justice Woods delivered the opinion of the court affirming the decrees of the court below dismissing the bills. In reissued letters patent granted for improvements in processes of preserving and packing cooked meats, a change in the mode of cooking the meat from broiling, roasting, or steaming, to boiling, all the other parts of the process remaining unchanged, is not an invention which will entitle the party who suggests the change to a patent for the process. Where all the elements in the process are old and are merely aggregated, and the aggregation brings out no new product, nor any old product in a cheaper or otherwise more advantageous way, the