Dable Grain Shovel Co. v. Flint

137 U.S. 41 (1890)

DABLE GRAIN SHOVEL COMPANY
v.
FLINT.

No. 1213.

Supreme Court of United States.

Submitted October 21, 1890. Decided November 3, 1890. ERROR TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS.

Mr. William Zimmerman for plaintiff in error.

Mr. Thomas A. Banning and Mr. Ephraim Banning for defendants in error.

MR. JUSTICE GRAY, after stating the case as above reported, delivered the opinion of the court.

The fourth plea is based upon section 7 of the act of March 3, 1839, c. 88, (in force when the patents were granted,) providing 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 and discoverer for 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 therefor to the inventor or any other person interested in such invention." 5 Stat. 354. In the later statutes, this provision has been reënacted with the qualification that the machine, manufacture or composition of matter must have been purchased from the inventor, or constructed with his knowledge and consent. Act of July 8, 1870, c. 230, § 37, 16 Stat. 203; Rev. Stat. § 4899.

It is agreed that the machines in question were constructed and put in use in the defendants' grain elevators by the inventor himself, and with his knowledge and consent, while he was in their employment as superintendent of machinery, and before his application for either patent. According to the express terms of the statute, therefore, the defendants had the right to continue to use these specific machines without paying any compensation to him or his assigns, whether asked for or not.

To the argument of the plaintiff's counsel, that the statute is unconstitutional as depriving the inventor of his property without compensation, there is a twofold answer: The patentee has no exclusive right of property in his invention, except under and by virtue of the statutes securing it to him, and according to the regulations and restrictions of those statutes. Gayler v. Wilder, 10 How. 477, 493; Brown v. Duchesne, 19 How. 183, 195; Marsh v. Nichols, 128 U.S. 605, 612. And these machines have been set free from his monopoly by his own act, consent and permission. Wade v. Metcalf, 129 U.S. 202.

Judgment affirmed.