If a person employed in the manufactory of another, while
receiving wages, makes experiments at the expense and in the
manufactory of his employer, has his wages increased in consequence
of the useful result of the experiments, makes the article invented
and permits his employer to use it, no compensation for its use
being paid or demanded, and then obtains a patent, these facts will
justify the presumption of a license to use the invention.
Such an unmolested and notorious use of the invention prior to
the application for a patent will bring the case within the
provisions of the 7th section of the Act of 1839, c. 88.
The assignees of a patent right take it subject to the legal
consequences of the previous acts of the patentee.
The 14th and 15th sections of the Act of 1836, c. 357, prescribe
the rules which must govern on the trial of actions for the
violation of patent rights, and these sections are operative, so
far as they are applicable, notwithstanding the patent may have
been granted before the passage of the act of 1836.
The words "any newly invented machine, manufacture, or
composition of matter" in the 7th section of the act of 1839 have
the same meaning as "invention" or "thing patented."
The facts are sufficiently stated in the opinion of the
court.
The bill of exceptions which was taken on the trial below was as
follows:
"And the plaintiff thereupon excepted to certain parts of the
instructions so given by the court to the jury, which instructions
so excepted to are hereinafter set forth, to-wit: "
" It has, however, been urged by the plaintiff's counsel that
the right to the continued use is restricted to the 'specific
machine, manufacture, or composition of matter so made or
purchased,' so that a defendant is protected no farther than in the
case of the invention (for which this patent was granted) prior to
the application, and is liable to damages if he makes any rolls by
Harley's plan afterwards. "
Page 42 U. S. 203
" We therefore feel bound to take the words 'newly invented
machine,' in the act of 1839, manufacture, or composition of matter
and such invention, to mean the invention patented, and the words
'specific machine,' to refer to the thing originally invented,
whereof the exclusive right is procured by patent, but not to any
newly discovered improvement to an existing patent."
" The use of the patent must be of the same specific improvement
originally invented, as was before the application used by any
person who had purchased or constructed the machinery on which he
operated to produce the effect described in the specification, but
when such person confines the future case to the specific mode,
method, manner, and process of producing the described effect, it
is by the words and true meaning of the law, without liability to
the inventor or other person interested in the invention, so
construed, and by thus protecting the person who has engaged the
use of an invention before the application for a patent, the great
object of the patent laws, as declared in the 4th section of the
act of 1837, will be consummated -- that is, to protect the rights
of the public and 'of patentees in patented inventions and
improvements.' 4 Story 2547. A different construction would make it
necessary to carry into all the former laws the same literal
exposition of the various terms used to express the same thing, and
thereby changing the law according to every change of phraseology
make it a labyrinth of inextricable confusion."
" Our opinion, therefore, is that the defendants have a right to
the continued use of the improvement patented to Harley; the facts
of the case, which are not controverted, have equal effect with a
license, and the evidence brings the defendant under the protection
of the act of 1839, by the unmolested notorious use of the
invention before the application for a patent. Nothing has been
shown on the part of the plaintiffs to counteract the effect of
this prior use; as assignees of Harley, they stand in his place as
to right and responsibility; they took the patent, subject to the
legal consequences of his previous acts, and connecting these with
the want of an assertion of a right, to the use by the defendants
of the invention patented, till this suit was brought in September,
1835, protects them from liability. "
Page 42 U. S. 204
" In our opinion, your verdict ought to be for the defendants.
Verdict accordingly, and judgment for defendants."
MR. JUSTICE BALDWIN delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case comes here on a writ of error to the Circuit Court for
the Western District of Pennsylvania in an action brought by the
plaintiffs, assignees of James Harley, against the defendants, for
the infringement of a patent granted to Harley for an improvement
in the mode of casting chilled rollers and other metallic cylinders
and cones, in which judgment was rendered for the defendants. On
the trial it appeared in evidence that it had long been a
desideratum to find out some mode by which iron rollers or
cylinders could be so cast that when the metal was introduced into
the mould it should cause a swirl or rotatory motion by which the
flog or dross would be thrown into the center instead of the
surface of the cylinder. By the old mode, the metal was conveyed
from the furnace to the mould through a gate or pipe placed in a
horizontal or perpendicular direction. The mode alleged to have
been invented by Harley is thus described in the specification
annexed to the patent:
"The tube or tubes, or passages called gates, through which the
metal to be conveyed into the moulds shall not enter the mould
perpendicularly at the bottom, but slanting, or in a direction
approaching to a tangent of the cylinder, or if the gates enter the
moulds horizontally or nearly so, shall not enter in the direction
of the axis of the cylinder, but in a tangent form, or inclining
towards a tangent of the cylinder."
This was the thing patented, consisting solely in changing the
direction of the tube, which conveyed the metal to the mould,
Page 42 U. S. 205
from a horizontal or perpendicular position to an angular one;
it produced the desired effect and was highly useful.
The novelty of the invention was much contested at the trial,
but as the case turned on other points, that became an immaterial
question; as the case comes before us, on exceptions to the charge
of the court, which assumed that Harley was the original and true
inventor of the improvement, and put the case to the jury on the
following facts, which were in full proof, in nowise contradicted,
and admitted to be true.
That Harley was employed by the defendants at their foundry in
Pittsburgh, receiving wages from them by the week; while so
employed, he claimed to have invented the improvement patented, and
after several unsuccessful experiments made a successful one in
October, 1834; the experiments were made in the defendants'
foundry, and wholly at their expense, while Harley was receiving
his wages, which were increased on account of the useful result.
Harley continued in their employment on wages until January or
February, 1835, during all which time he made rollers for them; he
often spoke about procuring a patent, and prepared more than one
set of papers for the purpose; made his application 17 February,
1835, for a patent; it was granted on 3 March, assigned to the
plaintiffs on 16 March, pursuant to an agreement made in
January.
While Harley continued in the defendants' employment, he
proposed that they should take out a patent and purchase his right,
which they declined; he made no demand on them for any compensation
for using his improvement, nor gave them any notice not to use it,
till, on some misunderstanding on another subject, he gave them
such notice, about the time of his leaving their foundry, and after
making the agreement with the plaintiffs, who owned a foundry in
Pittsburgh, for an assignment to them of his right. The defendants
continuing to make rollers on Harley's plan, the present action was
brought in October, 1835, without any previous notice by them. The
court left it to the jury to decide what the facts of the case
were; but if they were as testified, charged that they would fully
justify the presumption of a license, a special privilege, or grant
to the defendants to use the invention; that the facts amounted to
"a consent and allowance of such use," and show such a
consideration as would support
Page 42 U. S. 206
an express license or grant, or call for the presumption of one
to meet the justice of the case, by exempting them from liability;
having equal effect with a license, and giving the defendants a
right to the continued use of the invention. The court also charged
the jury that the facts of the case, which were not controverted,
brought it within the provisions of the 7th section of the act of
1839, by the unmolested, notorious use of the invention, before the
application for a patent by Harley, and that nothing had been shown
by the plaintiffs to counteract the effect of this prior use. That
as assignees of Harley, the plaintiffs stand in his place, as to
right and responsibility; they took the assignment of the patent,
subject to the legal consequences of his previous acts, and
connecting these with the absence of an assertion of a right
adverse to the defendants use till this suit was brought, protected
the defendants from liability for any damages therefor.
The exceptions to the charge were confined to these two points,
which constitute the only subject for our consideration. Whether
these exceptions are well taken or not must depend on the law as it
stood at the emanation of the patent, together with such changes as
have been since made, for though they may be retrospective in their
operation, that is not a sound objection to their validity; the
powers of Congress to legislate upon the subject of patents is
plenary by the terms of the Constitution, and as there are no
restraints on its exercise, there can be no limitation of their
right to modify them at their pleasure, so that they do not take
away the rights of property in existing patents.
When the patent to Harley was granted and this suit brought, the
acts of 1793 and 1800 were the tests of its validity, but the 21st
section of the act of 1836 repealed all existing laws on the
subject of patents, with a proviso that all suits brought before
may be prosecuted in the same manner as if that act had not been
passed,
"excepting and saving the application to any such action, of the
provision of the 14th and 15th sections of this act, so far as they
may be applicable thereto."
This repeal, however, can have no effect to impair the right of
property then existing in a patentee or his assignee according to
the well established principles of this Court in
21 U. S. 8
Wheat. 493; the patent must therefore stand as if the acts of 1793
and 1800 remained in force; in other respects, the 14th and 15th
sections of the act of
Page 42 U. S. 207
1836 prescribe the rules which must govern on the trial of
actions for the violation of patented rights, whether granted
before or after its passage.
In
Pennock v. Dialogue, this Court held, in 1829,
"That if an inventor makes his discovery public, looks on, and
permits others freely to use it, without objection or assertion of
claim to the invention, of which the public might take notice; he
abandons the inchoate right to the exclusive use of the invention,
to which a patent would have entitled him, had it been applied for,
before such use, and that it makes no difference in the principle,
that the article so publicly used, and afterwards patented, was
made by a particular individual who did so by the private
permission of the inventor."
27 U. S. 2 Pet.
14-15; S.P.
Grant v.
Raymond, 6 Pet. 248-249;
Shaw
v. Cooper, 7 Pet. 313-323.
On this construction of the acts of 1793 and 1800, Harley's
patent would have been void on the evidence in this case. Such
seems to have been the sense of Congress as expressed in the act of
1832, which authorized the issuing a new patent when an original
one was invalid by accident, inadvertence, or mistake, and without
any fraudulent intent, by reason of the terms of the 3d section of
the act of 1793 not having been complied with,
"Provided, however, that such new patent so granted shall in all
respects be liable to the same matters of objection and defense as
any original patent granted under the said first-mentioned act.
That no public use or privilege of the invention so patented,
derived from or after the grant of the original patent, either
under any special license of the inventor or without the consent of
the patentee that there shall be free public use thereof shall in
any manner prejudice the right of recovery for any use or violation
of his invention after the grant of such new patent, as
aforesaid."
4 Story 2301.
This act is an affirmance of the principles laid down by this
Court in the three cases before referred to, and as the exception
to the proviso is limited to an use of the invention under a
special license of the inventor after the grant of the original
patent, it leaves the use prior to the application for such patent
clearly obnoxious to the principle established in
27 U. S. 2 Pet.
14-15, whereby the patent would become void.
The same conclusion follows from the 15th section of the act
Page 42 U. S. 208
of 1836, which declares that if the thing patented "had been in
public use, or on sale, with the consent and allowance of the
patentee, before the application for a patent," judgment shall be
rendered for the defendant with costs. 4 Story 2511. The case
before us is one of this description: the defendants use the
invention of Harley for four months before his application for a
patent; this use was public, and not only with his express consent
and allowance, but he himself made the rollers on the plan he
invented during those months, from the time when he had ascertained
the utility of his invention.
It would therefore be no strained, if not the fair construction
of this act, if under such and the other circumstances in evidence
in the cause, the court had charged the jury, that if they believed
the witnesses, the patent subsequently obtained was void. The
circuit court, however, did not go so far; they held that the
defendants might continue to use the invention, without saying that
the public might use it, without liability to the plaintiffs, in
which we think there was no error in their direction to the jury;
that they might presume a license or grant from Harley, or on the
legal effect of the uncontroverted evidence as to the right of
recovery, by the plaintiffs, or on the construction of the acts of
1793, 1800, 1832, and 1836.
The remaining exception is to the charge of the court below, on
the effect of the 7th section of the act of 1839, which is in these
words:
"That every person or corporation who has or shall have
purchased or constructed any newly invented machine, manufacture,
or composition of matter, prior to the application by the inventor
or discoverer of a patent, shall be held to possess the right to
use and vend to others to be used, the specific machine,
manufacture, or composition of matter so made or purchased, without
liability therefore to the inventor or any other person interested
in such invention, and no patent shall be held invalid by reason of
such purchase, sale, or use prior to the application for a patent
as aforesaid, except on proof of abandonment of such invention to
the public, or that such purchase, sale, or prior use has been for
more than two years prior to such application for a patent."
Pamphlet Laws, 1839, 74, 75.
The object of this provision is evidently twofold -- first, to
protect the person who has used the thing patented, by having
purchased,
Page 42 U. S. 209
constructed, or made the machine &c., to which the invention
is applied, from any liability to the patentee or his assignee;
second, to protect the rights, granted to the patentee, against any
infringement by any other persons. This relieved him from the
effects of former laws and their constructions by this Court,
unless in case of an abandonment of the invention or a continued
prior use for more than two years before the application for a
patent, while it puts the person who has had such prior use on the
same footing as if he had a special license from the inventor to
use his invention, which, if given before the application for a
patent, would justify the continued use after it issued without
liability.
At the trial below and here, the plaintiff's counsel have
contended that this act cannot apply to the present case, inasmuch
as the protection it affords to the person who had the prior use,
is confined to the specific machine &c., and does not extend to
such use of the invention, or thing patented, if it does not
consist of a machine &c., as contradistinguished from the new
mode or manner in which an old machine or its parts operates, so as
to produce the desired effect; but we think that the law does not
admit of such construction, whether we look at its words or its
manifest objects, when taken in connection with former laws, and
the decisions of this Court in analogous cases.
The words "such invention" must be referred back to the
preceding part of the sentence, in order to ascertain the subject
matter to which it relates, which is none other than the newly
invented machine, manufacture, or composition of matter
constituting the thing patented; otherwise these words become
senseless when the invention is not strictly of a machine &c.
Now in the present case, we find the invention consists solely in
the angular direction given to the tube through which the metal is
conducted into the cylinder in which the roller is cast. Every part
of the machinery is old, the roller itself is no part of the
invention, and cannot be the machine, manufacture, or composition
of matter contemplated by Congress, nor can the word "specific"
have any practical effect unless it is applied to the thing
patented, whatever it may be, without making a distinction between
a machine &c., and the mode of producing a useful result by the
mere direction given to one of the parts of an old machine. Such a
construction
Page 42 U. S. 210
is not justified by the language of the law, and would defeat
both of its objects. If it does not embrace the case before us, the
consequence would be that the use of the invention, under the
circumstances in evidence, would, according to the decision in
27 U. S. 2 Pet.
14-15, invalidate the patent; for if the act operates to save the
avoidance of the patent, it must, of consequence, protect the
person who uses the invention before the application for a patent.
Both objects must be effected, or both must fail, as both parts of
the act refer to the same thing, and the same state of things, as
affecting the person using the newly invented machine, or the thing
patented, as well as the inventor. Had the words "invention," or
"thing patented," been used instead of machine &c., there could
have been no room for doubt of the application of the act to the
present case; and by referring to the phraseology of the different
acts of Congress denoting the invention, it is apparent that,
though there is a difference in the words used, there is none as to
their meaning or reference to the same thing. Thus we find in the
14th section of the act of 1836, relating to suits for using "the
thing whereof the exclusive right is secured by any patent," in the
15th, "his invention, his discovery, the thing patented," "that
which was in fact invented or discovered," "the invention or
discovery for which the patent issued," "that of which he was the
first inventor." In the 1st section of the act of 1837, "any patent
for any invention, discovery, or improvement," "inventions and
discoveries;" in the 2d section, "the invention;" in the 3d,
"invention or discovery;" in the 4th, "patented inventions and
improvements;" in the 5th, "the thing as originally invented." 4
Story 2510, 2511, 2546.
We therefore feel bound to take the words "newly invented
machine, manufacture, or composition of matter" and "such
invention," in the act of 1839, to mean the "invention patented,"
and the words "specific machine," to refer to "the thing as
originally invented," whereof the right is secured by patent, but
not to any newly invented improvement on a thing once patented. The
use of the invention before an application for a patent must be the
specific improvement then invented and used by the person who had
purchased, constructed, or used the machine to which the invention
is applied; so construed, the objects of the act of 1839 are
accomplished; a different construction would
Page 42 U. S. 211
make it necessary to carry into all former laws the same literal
exposition of the various terms used to express the same thing, and
thereby changing the law according to every change of mere
phraseology, make it a labyrinth of inextricable confusion.
We are therefore of opinion that there is no error in the charge
of the court below, and that its judgment be
Affirmed.
Order
This cause came on to be heard on the transcript of the record
from the Circuit Court of the United States for the Western
District of Pennsylvania and was argued by counsel. On
consideration whereof it is now here ordered and adjudged by this
Court that the judgment of the said circuit court in this cause be
and the same is hereby affirmed with costs.