Hobbs v. Beach’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

179 federal appellate · 95 district · 1 state decisions

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 426 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. ““It appears from the testimony that several of these addressing machines, of which that of Dennis and York is a type, and which are now claimed to have inspired the Beach patent, had been upon the market for many years, and yet it never seems to have occurred to any one engaged in the manufacture of paper boxes that they could be made available for the purpose of attaching strips to the comers of such boxes. This very fact is evidence that the man who discovered the possibility of their adaptation to this new use was gifted with the prescience of an inventor. While none of the elements of the Beach patent — taken separately or perhaps even in a somewhat similar combination— was new, their adaptation to this new use and the minor changes required for that purpose resulted in the establishment of practically a new industry, and was a decided step in advance of any that had heretofore been made. “We agree that if the Dennis and York machine' were designed for the purpose of attaching together the edges of paper boxes, where each surface was in line with the other, with the aid of flat dies and platen, it would require no invention, in view of other anticipating devices, to change this to dies with diverging faces for gluing boxes at their corners. But that is not all. Beach did not have before him a machine for attaching strips to the comers of paper boxes, but a machine for attaching addresses to newspapers, and while there is an analogy, there ■ can scarcely be said to be a si”

   5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Hallock v. Davison · Comptograph Co. v. Mechanical Accountant Co.

2. ““It appears from the testimony that several of these addressing machines, of which that of Dennis and York is a type, and which are now claimed to have inspired the Beach patent, had been upon the market for many years and yet it never seemed to have occurred to any one engaged in the manufacture of paper boxes that they could be made available for the purpose of attaching strips to the corner of such boxes. This very fact is evidence that the man who discovered the possibility of their adaption to this new use was gifted with the prescience of an inventor. While none of the elements of the Beach patent — taken separately or perhaps even in a somewhat similar combination — was new, their adaption to this new use and the minor changes required for that purpose resulted in the establishment of practically a new industry, and was a decided step in advance of any that had theretofore been made.””

   5 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Killeen v. Buffalo Furnace Co. · O'Rourke Engineering Const. Co. v. McMullen

3. “: 257 We are not concerned with the subordinate differences in the mechanism, least of all with the different names given by Horton to parts of his machine similar to the corresponding parts in the Beach patent. As the two machines are alike in their functions, combination and elements, it is unnecessary to go further and inquire whether they are alike or unlike in their details. 258 The Court did not limit application of the doctrine to”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Leadam v. Ringgold & Co. · Jay v. Ireland & Matthews Mfg. Co.