Buser v. Novelty Tufting Machine Co.’s Empirical Analysis
151 F. 478 · 1907
Citation profile
12 federal appellate · 3 district ·
How this case has been cited
Cited by 24 later decisions — most recently July 1965
12 federal appellate · 3 district ·
Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.
Relationships
Relies on Washburn Moen Manuf'G Co v. Beat 'Em All Barbed-Wire Co · Gayler v. Wilder · Coffin v. Ogden · Columbus Chain Co. v. Standard Chain Co. · Stitt v. Eastern R. Co.
Most-quoted passages
The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 24 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
““If, however, the machine or other thing is complete, and capable of producing the result sought to be accomplished, it has passed the experimental stage, and becomes an invention; and, in order that it may constitute an anticipation, it is immaterial how well it becomes known, or how much it is used. * * * Indeed, it has been held that if the alleged invention is complete, and capable of producing the result sought to be accomplished, though it may never have been used, it is an invention and an anticipation. * * * Where the idea of the machine has been conceived, and the conception carried into effect by the construction of the machine, which is used, or is capable of being'used, for the purpose for which it was designed, it is no longer an experiment, but an invention; and the subsequent abandonment of the use of the machine does not render it an abandoned experiment, nor lessen its effect as an anticipation, which will invalidate a subsequent patent to another tor substantially the same machine. * * * If, then, an alleged invention is in1-fact an invention, no subsequent abandonment of it can be said to be an abandoned experiment. At most, it is an abandoned invention; but an in "vention that has been abandoned is as much an anticipation, and to as great extent negatives novelty, as an invention that has not been abandoned.””
2 later decisions quote this exact passage““It the thing were embryotic or inchoate; if it rested in speculation; * * * if the process pursued for its development had failed to reach the point of consummation — it cannot avail to defeat a patent founded upon a discovery or invention which was completed, while in the other case there was only progress, however near that progress may have approximated to the end in view. The law requires not conjecture, but certainty. If the question relate to a machine, the conception must have been clothed in substantial forms which demonstrate at once its practical efficacy and utility.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority““The evidence is sufficient to support the defense of prior knowledge and use, if it proves the invention was complete and capable of work ing; if it had been put to use, and was known to any considerable number of persons. * * * If the construction of the prior thing of itself demonstrates that it is within the principle of the patent, then, perhaps, no use need be established, for it might be said to prove itself. * * * It is not necessary that the prior invention should have been actually used for the purpose contemplated, but it must have been capable of such use.””
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majoritye.g. In re Schlittler
How this case has been treated — in progress
Whether each later court followed, distinguished, criticized, or overruled this decision. The treatment classification (task #35) runs highest-cited cases first and lights up here as it reaches this one.