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By the Supreme Court of the united States. Reissue Letters Patent No. 6,673 granted to Mrs. P. DufE, E. A. Kitzmiller, and R. P. DufE, October 5, 1875, for an improvement in washboai'ds, on the surrender of original letters patent No. 111,585, granted to Westly Todd, as in-ventor, February 7, 1871, are not infringed by a washboard constructed in accordance with the description contained in letters patent No. 171,568, granted to Aaron J. Hull, December 28, 1875. In view of prior inventions, the Claims of the Todd patent must be limited to tbe form shown--namely, projections bounded by crossing horizontal and vertical grooves--nd do not Cover diamond-shaped projections bounded by crossing diagonal grooves. In the fleld of washboards madeof sheet metal, with the surface broken into protuberances formed of the body of the metal, so as to make a rasping surface and to strengthen the metal by its shape, and to provide Channels for the water to run off, Todd was not a pioneer, but merely devised a new form to accomplish those results; and his patent does not Cover a form which is a substantial departure from his. Letters patent granted to Edwin L. Brady, December 17, 1867, for an improved dredge boat for excavating rivers, declared to be invalid for want of novelty and invention. The design of the patent laws is to reward those who make some substantial discovery or invention which adds to our knowledge and makes a step in advance in the useful arts. It was never their object to graut a monopoly for every trlfling device, every sbadow of a shade of an idea, which would naturally and spontaneously occur to any skilled me-chanic or Operator in the ordinary progress of manufactures. Although a patent is not set up by way of defense in an answer, yet if the invention patented thereby is afterward put into actual use, tbedate of the patent will be evidence of the date of the invention on a question of priority between different parties. One person receiving from another a fll and accurate description of a useful improvement cannot appropriate it to himself, and a patent obtained by him therefore will be void. By the Court of Claim of the united States. The language of the Constitution confers upon Congress the power of " securing to inventors the exciusive right to their discoveries." It is not empowered to graut to inventors a favor, but to secure to them a rigbt; and the term '' to secure a right" by no iiossible implication carries with it the opposite power of deslroying the rigbt, in whole or in part, by appropriating it to the purposes of the Government, without complying with that other condition of the Constitution, the making of " just compensation." Neither does the term "the exciusive right" admit of an implication that, with regard to such patentable artieles as the Government may need, the right sball not be exciusive. Such right, when properly secured in the manner provided by law, becomes property in the eye of the law, and the Government cannot make use of tbe improvement any more than a private individual without license of the inventor or making him compensation. Where, as in this case, there is clearly an implied contract between the Government and the Citizen, and the suit is brought entirely upon that agreement, and the claimant is without judicial redress elsewhere, the Court of Claims of the United States has exciusive Jurisdiction. The above deeision has been conArmed by the Supreme Court of the United States. By varlous Circuit Courts of the C/iilted States A licensee is at liberty to contest tbe question wbether the artieles made byhim embody the invention or any material part thereof,,and a stipulation to the contrary in the contract is of no effect. In a suit by a patentee against a licensee for license fees for the use of a patented improvement, something corre-sponding to an eviction of the licensee-must be pleaded and proved if he would defend against an action for royalties. Where plaintiff's claim must be construed as a " shortened vamp "--that is, a vamp which ends substantially where tbe box toe begins--as a means of uniting the box-toe and tip to the Upper, and defendant's vamp is carried for the fll length over tbe toe and lasted with the sole, UM that there was no use of plaintifE's invention. A mere license to make aud use, without the right to grant to others to make and use, the thing patented, though exciusive, will not authorize the licensee to bring suit in his own name for infringement without joining the patentee. mW, if the patentee refuses to join, a court of equity can give a remedy to the licensee. Where a manufacturing Company and a Arm entered into 1 contract by which the form- let out to the latter all Ihe power, machinery. etc., of the Company, to be used for the manufacture of tools, and foi' cairying on the business of 357 the Company agreed to be done by the latter parties in Cooperation with the directors, the firm agreeing to payasrent ten per cent of their net sales, the profltsof the Consolidated Company to be shared in certain proportions, Held, that the manufacturing Company are not responsible for Ihe manufacture of try-squares complained of, made by the firm for its own use in the rented premises. May a Jandlord be enjoined from permitting bis tools and macliinery to beused for the injury of a third person? Qumre. An improvement in try Squares which produces a tool more convenient, with a larger capacity, and more accurate, by adding to such a tool a slot in one of the arms, is a pa-tentable inventiou. Wliether a reissue is wholly valid or not, it may be valid to the extent that claims in the original and in the reissue are alilse; and if those Claims are infringed, an injunction may be granted. The reissued patent of John Lovatt, May 30, 1876, being cnuoh broader than the original, declared void. The riglit to have corrections made by reissue may be abandoned and lost by unreasonable delay. A reissued patent which enlarges an original patent--i. e., Which makes the invention patented other and more inclusive than the original letters patent--is void as agalnst in-tervening rights and the public as well. Tbe object of the law on the subject of patents is to advance the interest of the public by securing certain ex-clusive rights to patentees, and among those rights is that of changing, by a surrenderor reissue, the language when the idea remains the same. Reissued Letters Patent No. 8,590, granted Pebruary 18, 1879, to Charles T. Day, for an improvement in skates, oonstrued and Held not to be anticipated by the invention patented June 23, 1869, by Alpheus 8. Hunter. Reissued Letters Patent No. 6,811,granted to John Parker, December 21,1875, for an improvement in fly-traps, exam-ined and held to be invalid. Reissued Letters Patent No. 8,493, granted to James M. Harpec, June 22, 1875, for an improvement in fly-traps, construed and Held not to be Infringed by the defendaat's structure. In the fly-trap whose construction is otherwiseold it is not a patentable invention to strengthen the wire-cloth case by the use of upright and horizontal .stays, nor to similarly strengthen the wire cone by annular and upright stays. These are suggestions which would occur to any skilled mechanic in constructing such Chambers of wire-cloth, from the very nature of the material, and are mere matters of workmanship involying no invention. There is no patentable invention in fastening the cone of a, fly-ti;"!"' to the base by slipping the horizontal annular stay of the former within tbat of -the latter, so that they shall coincide, nor in nestiug such cones for transportation. The damages recovered in a sult for infringement are merely a satisfaction for prior use, and do not free the parties infringing from the Operation of a patent. The use"bf part of an invention covered by a patent may constitute an infringement, and a party so using an invention after injunction granted adjudged guilty of contempt. "Where skates containing an improvement on an earlier patent held by tbe same inventor were in use or were offered for saleby the same inventor, whether actually sold or not, more than two years before bis application for bis second or subordinate patent, the latter is void. The decision of the Patent Office upon an interference proceeding is sufficient to entitle the successful party, as against the defeated party or bis privies, to a preliminary injunction upon the question of priority of invention. The defeated party may, in another action, raise the question of wantof novelty in the invention ; yet if he had know-ledge of the state of the art at the time he made bis application, the want of novelty must be made clearly apparent. Letters Patent No. 259,597, granted to Stephen N. Smith, June 13, 1882, for an improvement in machines for making lacing-hooks for shoes, construed and Held not to be anticipated by Letters Pptent No. 102,195, granted April 19, 1870, to S. W. Young, or by Reissued Letters Patent No. 9,837, to Lauriston Towne, August 9, 1881. Letters Patent No. 177,334, granted toAbnerB. Hutcbins, May 16, 1876, for an improvement in hydrocarbon-stoves, examined. The court declined to consider whether the invention was sufficiently described in a prior Canadian patent, or whether the invention had been in public use for more than two years prior to flling the application, it ap-pearing that the defendants' structure did not infringe the Claim of the patent. Disclaimers, qualifications, and limitations imposed upon a patentee by the Patent Office are forever binding upon him, if he chooses to accept a patent containing them, and they forbid any subsequent enlargement, whether by reissue or by a broad construction of Claims thus intended to be limited. If an applicant considers a case important enough, he may refuse to take a limited patent, and being then rejected,may apply to the Supreme Court of the Dislrict of Columbia, and if still dissatisfied, he has bis remedy in equity by section 4,515 Revised Statutes. Here remedies are ample, and they are excluslve under the decisions. Construlng the patent according to the requirements of the Office acqulesced in by the patentee. Heidthat thedefend-ant did not infringe, because Ms frame has not the peculiar construction which the Examiaer dclayed wai tJJ? ooly grouad for issuiog Ihe patent.
