Hendrie v. Sayles’s Empirical Analysis
98 U.S. 546 · 1878
Citation profile
13 federal appellate · 7 district · 16 state decisions
How this case has been cited
Cited by 63 later decisions (3 by the Supreme Court) — most recently September 2015 · most notably Root v. Railway Co. (1881), 147 Cal. App. 2d 357 - Stevens v. Marco (1956)
13 federal appellate · 7 district · 16 state decisions — followed in 10 states
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 Gayler v. Wilder · Railroad Company v. Trimble · Wunsch v. McGraw
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 63 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.
“inventors’ rights are never derivative, and they, even before the patent is issued, have the exclusive inchoate right not only to the original patent that may issue, but to any reissue, renewal, or extension that may thereafter be granted under the Patent Act. Authorities to support that proposition are numerous and decisive, and it is equally clear that they may sell, assign, or convey the invention, including the inchoate right to obtain the patent, and to surrender and reissue it or to procure a renewal or extension of the monopoly from the commissioner, if the instrument of assignment contains apt words to show that such was the intent of the grantor.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“An assignment of an invention secured by letters-patent ... is a contract, and, like all other contracts, is to be construed so as to carry out the intention of the parties to it ... it is well settled that the title of an inventor to obtain an extension may be the subject of a contract of sale, and when it is, the instrument by which the sale was effected is the proper subject of construction, in order to determine whether it secures to the purchaser any subsequent extension of the patent, or merely the patent for the original term.”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority“A deed of assignment ... by which a paten-tee of an invention conveys all the right, title, and interest which he has in the ‘said invention’ ... and also all right, title, and interest which may be secured to him from time to time ... carries the entire invention and all alterations and improvements and all patents whatsoever, issued and extensions alike[.]”
1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
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.